CHINA’S quality watchdog said yesterday Samsung will recall all 190,984 Galaxy Note 7 phones that it has sold in the Chinese mainland.

    The South Korean tech giant decided yesterday to stop production, sales and replacement of Galaxy Note 7, indicating a permanent removal of the model from its product mix following reported cases of replacement phones catching fire and overheating.

    The latest recall in China includes the 1,858 early-release Galaxy Note 7 smartphones that the watchdog ordered recalled Sept. 14.

    The news comes a day after Samsung halted sales of Note 7 once again and began asking users to return the device.

    The move spells an end to the short, controversial and explosive life of the Note 7, which launched as one of the best-reviewed Android phones ever made but quickly became an unprecedented nightmare for Samsung. This incident could hurt the company’s credibility with consumers for a long time.

    The Note 7, which hit the market in mid-August, was expected to solidify Samsung’s lead in the mobile market after a strong showing with its Galaxy S7. The company had just begun to regain its swagger after stumbling the previous year with lackluster products.

    Then came the battery problems, which caused some units to overheat and catch fire. Samsung issued a global recall of the popular device last month. It worked with government agencies to get safe replacement units to owners of the phone.

    The company has said that more than half of its defective phones have been returned and that about 90 percent of people had chosen to trade their old Note 7 in for a new one.

    Perhaps those owners should have switched phones entirely. There have been a handful of reports of overheating in replacement devices. One caused the evacuation of a Southwest Airlines flight in the U.S. state of Kentucky last week; another hurt a teenage girl. U.S. carrier partners Verizon, Sprint, AT&T and T-Mobile have stopped selling the Note 7 and are letting customers exchange their replacement Note 7 for a different phone entirely.

    So far nearly 50 incidents of Note 7 causing fires have been reported in the United States. More importantly, many people have been physically injured with their new Galaxy phone catching fire, according to media reports.

    There have been 20 cases of Galaxy Note 7 phones catching fire or overheating on the Chinese mainland, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said in a statement yesterday.

    (SD-Xinhua)