(UDHAYAM, SOUTH KOREA) – Samsung’s probe into its Galaxy Note 7 fiasco has found that the overheating and burning of the phones was caused by defective batteries.
The firm had axed its iPhone rival in October last year after an earlier botched recall and re-release.
On Monday, Samsung said that neither software nor hardware other than the batteries were at fault.
The recall is thought to have cost $5.3bn (£4.3bn) and was hugely damaging for the South Korean firm’s reputation.
Internal and independent investigations “concluded that batteries were found to be the cause of the Note 7 incidents”, the South Korean technology giant said in a statement.
The company said that errors both in design and manufacturing affected batteries by two different manufacturers.
According to the findings the problems centre on the large batteries not fitting well into the phones, as well as insufficient insulation material within the batteries.
Samsung said it was “taking responsibility for our failure to ultimately identify and verify the issues arising out of the battery design and manufacturing process”.
Launched in August 2016, Samsung’s Note 7 device was marketed as a large-screen top-end device and positioned as a rival to Apple’s iPhone.
In September though, Samsung had to recall about 2.5 million phones after complaints of overheating and exploding batteries.
The firm insisted that all replaced devices were safe. However, that was followed by reports that those phones were also overheating.
