The outfit said it made a “difficult decision” to suspend production at its only China phone factory in its effort to enhance efficiency.

Samsung will continue to manufacture smartphones in its factories located in other countries including Vietnam and India. But Samsung has been testing the waters with ODM devices manufactured under license by Chinese companies.

Samsung’s first two ODM devices – the Galaxy A6s and Galaxy A10s – have not been assembled in Samsung’s facilities, and we assume the closing down of the Haizhou plant won’t have any effect on how future ODM phones wearing the Samsung badge will be developed in China. In fact, earlier estimates suggested the company could ship up to 40 million ODM phones manufactured in China by the end of the year.

The move might have been due to the fact that Samsung had not been able to penetrate the Chinese market with any degree of success.