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Inside the Giant Warehouse Where Broken Samsung Phones Get Fixed
When Samsung announced the Galaxy S23 series in February, it highlighted that the S23 Ultra has twice as many recycled components as the Galaxy S22 Ultra. Its one of several changes Samsung has made in the name of sustainability over the past several years, along with slimming down its product packaging by forgoing the power adapter. But sustainability is about more than recycling and repurposing materials. Experts say repairability is also hugely impactful in reducing moving toward a circular economy. Samsung still has a lot of progress to make on that front. Modern Samsung phones like the Galaxy S22 and S23 arent as easy to repair as they should be, according to the technicians at iFixit. A giant warehouse in Texas could be key in Samsungs efforts to change that. At its repair facility in Irving, where about 14,500 gadgets arrive for repair per month, Samsung does more than disassemble dysfunctional devices. It dissects the repair process, too, taking in learnings that can be applied to future product designs and procedures. With growing concern around electronic waste and top-of-the-line smartphones costing upward of $1,000, theres increased interest in holding onto devices for as long as possible. A survey from insurance provider Assurant published in September said the average age of traded-in phones surpassed 3.5 years for the first time. This shift suggests consumers are sticking with their current phones for longer periods of time before upgrading. Making devices more repairable — and providing easier access to repairs — is a key part of further extending a phones lifecycle. For Samsung, the next major step in improving the repair process could be shortening the amount of time between when you drop your broken phone in the mailbox and when it arrives back on your doorstep. "We want to get as close to same-day as we can," said Mark Williams, vice president of customer care for Samsung Electronics America. Samsungs warehouse is like a smartphone hospital The receiving area of Samsungs mail-in repair facility. The receiving area of Samsungs mail-in repair facility. Samsung Inside Samsungs sprawling 23,000-square-foot warehouse, Im surrounded by machines in all shapes and sizes. Its quiet, aside from the sounds of various machines beeping and air gaskets blowing. Samsungs mail-in repair facility almost feels like a smartphone hospital; its where screens are disassembled and new ones are meticulously pressed on and dozens of diagnostic tests are performed. Of the devices Samsung receives each month, 67% are phones, 24% are watches, 6% are earbuds and 3% are tablets, the company says. The exhaustive repair process begins at 10:30 a.m., when device shipments begin arriving at the facility. Cameras situated around the intake area record the condition of packages and devices as they were received. Products are placed into color-coded trays to keep track of when they arrived. For example, red trays might have been used on Tuesday, while green trays were used on Wednesday. That tells workers they should prioritize the red trays first. The color-coded trays used in the receiving area of Samsungs repair facility Color-coded trays help Samsung keep track of which day a device arrived for repair. Samsung After the receiving process is completed, devices are sent to the incoming quality check area, or IQC as Samsung calls it. This is where technicians run tests, most of which are automated, to find the cause of the problem. Samsung then compares its findings against the customers complaint. The screen repair process starts at the disassembly station, where hot plates are used to heat devices and soften adhesive so that theyre easier to dismantle. Once the inside of the device has been cleaned and the tape that bonds the display to the frame has been added, the phone undergoes a handful of processes for attaching, pressing, bonding and clamping the new screen and bezel to the device — each of which requires special machinery. The hot plates used at the screen disassembly station in Samsungs repair facility The hot plates used at the screen disassembly station in Samsungs repair facility Samsung After reassembling a device, resin bonding is applied to make the device water resistant. Samsung then uses a simulated air-pressure machine to test water resistance, ensuring it measures up to its intended IP rating before the device goes back to its owner. Theres also machinery for testing 4G and 5G, as well as calibrating the camera. Getting to same-day repairs The entire process — from performing diagnostics to the repair itself and the final outbound quality checks — takes roughly four to seven days, says John Meagher, Samsungs senior director of mail-in operations. Thats a long time to be without your phone. Williams tells me the company looks to address this by opening two more regional mail-in repair centers in the second quarter of this year: one in Dallas and another in Florida. The Dallas location would serve Texas and Oklahoma, while the Florida one would cover Florida and Georgia, freeing up the main Irving facility for repairs from elsewhere in the US. The additional centers should lower shipping times for those areas, says Williams. If those centers are successful, Samsung wants to open another in the Northeast and an additional location in the West. A machine in Samsungs repair facility used for screen bonding The machine thats used for bonding the screen during the display repair process. Samsung Its part of the companys objective to get as close to same-day mail-in repairs as possible, although there are still several challenges to overcome. Among the biggest is timing. Since devices are dropped off at 10:30 a.m. and picked up at 6 p.m., the company has a relatively short window to work with. Samsung may not always always have all the necessary components in stock, and some issues take longer to diagnose than others. "We think theyre not insurmountable," said Meagher of the challenges. "We think very shortly, well have some sort of a solution that will make an expedited repair for mail in a reality." The company is testing expedited service concepts that are in a pilot stage, according to Williams, but he couldnt share additional details. Samsung also offers in-person repair services at more than 1,000 authorized US locations and repair vans that serve as mobile repair shops for faster, same-day service. But only eight of those authorized repair centers are Samsung-branded locations, while the majority are run by Samsungs partners like uBreakiFix and Best Buy. (Apple, Samsungs biggest competitor in the mobile space, has more than 270 Apple Stores in the US.) "We think very shortly, well have some sort of a solution that will make an expedited repair for mail in a reality." John Meagher, Samsungs senior director of mail-in operations Samsung sells home repair kits in collaboration with iFixit, too, a move that came after Samsung and other tech giants faced pressure from self-repair advocates and legislators to make DIY repairs more accessible. The company says more than 2,170 customers have used the self-repair program through iFixit so far. But some Samsung device owners dont feel the companys efforts have gone far enough. Reddit threads detail experiences of repairs being delayed or canceled, sometimes resulting in a customer being without a phone for several weeks. "My Fold 3 has been at Samsung for over 5 weeks," read one comment posted one year ago in response to a question on Reddit about Samsungs repair timeline. Making devices more repairable Samsungs repair center also has a larger role to play in how Samsung designs and develops upcoming phones to be more repairable. Feedback from this facility gets sent to Samsungs design teams to make devices easier to fix in the future. Samsung also sends employees from the companys headquarters in South Korea to Texas to observe the repair process and ensure that best practices are being applied in other regions. "We want to reduce that [repair] time," said Williams. "We want to identify Are all these tests necessary? Should we do it? Are there any additional tests we should do?" The tape pressing machine used at Samsungs repair facility. The tape pressing machine used at Samsungs repair facility. Samsung One such example of this feedback shows in the tape thats used to bond the Galaxy S23s screen, according to Edhir Tukic, Samsungs director of customer engineering. The company previously used a hot melt application to bond the screen, which meant machinery was required to remove the display. Now that Samsung has switched to the tape method, the company can offer screen repairs at walk-in locations rather than just through its mail-in repair service. Samsung made that change in the third quarter of 2022 starting with the Galaxy S21 and Galaxy S21 Plus models. But Samsungs Galaxy S23 only earned a 4 out of 10 on iFixits repairability score. That shows theres still plenty of work to be done, even though its an improvement from the Galaxy S22s 3 out of 10 score. iFixit gave Samsung credit this year for including a battery pull tab in the Galaxy S23, which should theoretically make it easier to remove the battery. (Although iFixit still struggled to do so, as shown in this video.) iFixit also said it would award Samsung an additional two points if and when repair manuals and parts are made available for the Galaxy S23 lineup. Samsung said it plans to expand the range of products and parts as the program matures. It also said repair volumes tend to skew toward models that have been in the market longer.
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