Category Archives: Technology

For those who do not know exactly what Virtual Reality is or what it means: essentially, it attempts to place participants in the body of someone else, in different locations and scenarios, with all the accommodating sights and sounds in their full glory.

On October 13th, Sony released its new Virtual Reality headset, entitled “Playstation VR.” It will set you back $399 USD, if you do not already own the Playstation 4 Console, Camera, Move Controllers and VR worlds (currently the only available game). Including these four necessities, the cost totals to a whopping $799 USD. Standalone, this is the cheapest way to experience VR to date. Its only two competitors available for purchase are the Oculus Rift and and HTC Vive, costing $599 and $799 respectively (Kain, 2016). Reviews for Playstation VR have been incredibly positive thus far. I found this particular blog post on TechRadar to be useful and interesting because it made an all-encompassing and thorough argument for Playstation VR.

The whole VR craze began with the release of the Oculus rift back in March, and in the months leading up to the release of Playstation VR, demand for VR was beginning to slow. As Thomas Westerman stated in his blog post on the subject, many critics throughout that period labeled VR as “an over-priced gimmick,” due to its lack of content and immersion, and its nausea-inducing, inconsistent control schemes. Thomas Westerman is right in his sentiment that it is not a fad. Now, excitement is rising once again as Playstation VR has managed to build off of the mistakes of the two attempts preceding it. Having spent many hours playing as an expert diamond thief, a deep sea diver, and professional luge rider on the Playstation VR personally, I can say that Sony did a great job in that respect. It is fun, engaging, and easy to control. This is not to mention that after playing for long periods of time, I have not felt nauseous at all. In fact, the headset is extremely comfortable. You also do not need much space to set up the system and play.

In terms of sales to date (October 30th), the Playstation VR has done exceedingly well. Operations management definitely projected sales to be lower than what they are, as the product has sold out on US and UK Amazon with shortages in Best Buy, Walmart and Target as well (Brooke, 2016). This is, of course, great news for Sony.

All in all, I will definitely be picking up my own Playstation VR bundle once it is restocked. Sony has really broke new ground in making Virtual Reality accessible in the home.

Word Count: 443

References (APA):

[Playstation VR Bundle (Including PS4)]. (n.d.). Retrieved October 30, 2016, from https://c4.staticflickr.com/9/8362/30115850755_1df580eb2f_z.jpg

Brooke, S. (2016, October 25). PlayStation VR Has Sold Out on Amazon in UK and US. Retrieved October 30, 2016, from http://www.pushsquare.com/news/2016/10/playstation_vr_has_sold_out_on_amazon_in_uk_and_us

Kain, E. (2016, October 15). Virtual Reality Is Just An Over-Priced Gimmick, Nothing More. Retrieved October 30, 2016, from http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2016/10/15/virtual-reality-is-just-an-over-priced-gimmick/#5222b0062e0a

Pino, N. (2016, October 24). PlayStation VR review. Retrieved October 30, 2016, from http://www.techradar.com/reviews/gaming/playstation-vr-1235379/review

Westerman, T. (2016, October 15). There’s Nothing Virtual About This Reality. Retrieved October 30, 2016, from https://blogs.ubc.ca/thomaswesterman/

Samsung electronics has recently fallen under heavy criticism due to exploding batteries in their defective Galaxy Note 7 products. Before they issued a much-warranted 2.5 million unit recall, there were “35 reported incidents of overheating smartphones worldwide,” with one explosion in a young boys hand (Hollister, 2016). Even since this recall, the number of known explosive devices has risen to 140.

How does this affect where people that are still keeping their phones can go? Definitely not airplanes. A southwestern airlines flight was evacuated 10 minutes before it was set to take off as a phone began to smoke up the entire cabin. As of October 15th, Transport Canada and the U.S. Department of Transportation have announced that these phones will not be allowed to be carried on board, shipped as cargo, or in checked bags regardless of whether they are turned off (Lowy, 2016). Australia, Asia and Europe have all followed suit in enforcing this law as well (BBC, 2016).

We discussed in our tutorial how it is extremely important to examine how a company reacts to an issue rather than just look at the issue itself. Samsung’s overall response to the problem was far less than stellar. They created a quick fix by artificially limiting maximum battery charge to 60% (in order to maintain their projected profits), yet this did not guarantee that the battery would not explode (Orf, 2016). Their customer service in dealing with refunds within the recall has also been atrocious, described by many as slow and inefficient.

Clearly, the negative implications of this issue are massive (to almost all stakeholders) and have dealt a severe blow to Samsung’s brand image. This is not to mention the barrier it has created in their revenue streams, with their opportunity costs amounting to 17 Billion Dollars by some analysts calculations. These losses originate mainly from a decrease in the market value of their shares and decrease to 0 in sales. In other words, their fixed and variable costs in production all ended up yielding minimal revenue.

As Mike Schellenberg stated in his blog post, this entire issue is amplified by the fact that Apple has just launched their iPhone 7. This means that “if Android users decide to make the switch to the iPhone 7, they may never go back.” I completely and utterly agree with Mike Schellenberg’s insightful commentary.

Samsung’s lack of product testing and care in production both created an easily avoidable problem which would have saved their profits and their marketability.

Word Count: 417

References (APA):

[Exploded Galaxy Note 7 Smartphone]. (n.d.). Retrieved October 16, 2016, from http://www.allword-news.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/1458340684_Samsung-Galaxy-phone-expl_1.jpg

Hollister, S. (2016, October 10). Here’s why Samsung Note 7 phones are catching fire. Retrieved October 16, 2016, from https://www.cnet.com/news/why-is-samsung-galaxy-note-7-exploding-overheating/

Lowy, J. (2016, October 15). Samsung Galaxy Note 7 smartphones banned from Canadian, U.S. airlines over fire concerns. Retrieved October 16, 2016, from http://business.financialpost.com/fp-tech-desk/samsung-galaxy-note-7-smartphones-banned-from-canadian-u-s-airlines-over-fire-concerns

Orf, D. (2016, September 13). Samsung Is Limiting Note 7 Batteries to 60 Percent to Avoid More Explosions. Retrieved October 16, 2016, from http://gizmodo.com/samsung-is-limiting-note-7-batteries-to-60-percent-to-a-1786570629

Samsung Galaxy Note 7 banned by more airlines over fire risk. (2016, October 16). Retrieved October 16, 2016, from http://www.bbc.com/news/business-37674170

Schellenberg, M. (2016, October 15). Samsung Galaxy Note 7 Recall. Retrieved October 30, 2016, from https://blogs.ubc.ca/mikeschellenberg/