Samsung is going to have lesser competition in the low-end Android market as HTC has announced that they will not be delving into low-end smartphones in the future and will be focusing only on mid to high-segment phones.
HTC’s CEO Peter Chou has said that the kind of compromises needed to be made for low-end smartphones would really sully HTC’s name. Considering that low-end Android phones aren’t usually that good specially with Android’s already high requirements to be smooth and lag-free, it seems to be a pretty smart move. The low-end market is also flooded with many other manufacturers including local ones like ZTE which have extremely lower prices, so focusing on that segment isn’t really very financially advantageous for HTC.
As long as HTC continues to deliver well-built smartphones like the One series, or even the mid-range phones like the Desire C, I’m pretty sure people won’t have a problem.