The Smartphone market is always alive and booming, thanks to the excellent product innovations by the mobile companies. Today’s consumer has access to the entire pool of information through various sources, especially the Internet and hence they are well equipped with desired info while researching and evaluating different alternatives before making the actual purchase. Due to this, Smartphone companies are compelled to invest significantly in R & D and come up with super competitive products. Despite rising prices of high end smart phones, there is an ever rising demand for smart phones. Smartphone companies also have been coming up with cutting edge innovations and hence, the consumer gets to choose between a wide range of high end smart phones. In the last few years, Samsung has emerged as a key player in the Smartphone market and has managed to grab a huge chunk of the market share. At the same time, the sales of some brands which used to be major players in the Smartphone market once, have dipped considerably.

Across Europe*, Android remains the number one OS with 73.3% share. Apple is second with 16.6% share and Windows third with 8.1%. *The big five European markets includes UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. (Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, 2014).

In Italy, the smart phone penetration in 2013 was 41.3% compared to 27.9% in 2012 (Our Mobile Planet, 2013). With tremendous increase in smart phone usage in recent years, people consider various factors while they decide to purchase a smart phone. A consumer’s buying behavior is influenced by cultural, social and personal factors (Kotler & Keller, 2012). Consumer behavior might be affected by many factors like individual motivations, attitudes, values, needs, personality traits, social and cultural background, sex, age, professional status and some social influences by family, colleagues, friends and society. This study aims to assess the consumer buying behavior of Samsung Galaxy Note 5 compared to other smart phones in the Italy market. The study is primarily focused on customer buying behavior, consumer’s needs, evaluation of the alternatives and their post purchase satisfaction. The study also covers the existing Samsung Galaxy Note 5 customers, their assessment of its performance and areas for improvement. The study involves qualitative and quantitative research through focus group discussions, interviews, surveys, etc. Moreover this research also takes us through the five step decision making process of consumer purchase. The entire consumer’s purchase process can be classified into a five step problem solving process namely need recognition, information search, evaluation of alternatives, purchase and post purchase behavior. This five stage decision making model is most appropriate for the consumer behavior of purchase decision for complex purchases. In the same manner, purchase decision for smart phones follows the same process but in some cases, the buyer decision can also be affected by specific bias associated with some brands. A lot of decision behavior exhibited by consumers can differ from one person to another because they may use different processes to choose rather than only using mathematical modeling (Swait and Adamowicz, 2001). Purchase decisions of many consumers may be affected by both rational factors as well as emotional factors. A younger consumer would prefer emotional features over rational features in smart phones (Wilska, 2003). This makes it apparent that there can be numerous factors that affect a consumer’s desire and inclination to purchase a Samsung Galaxy Note 5 over other smart phones available in the market.

The objective of this research is to understand consumer purchase patterns and what they expect from smart phones so that the information can be used in relevant product launches. This research also aims to identify the opportunities and market gaps where Smartphone companies can position their products to tap those segments. This study also intends to identify the perception of Samsung Galaxy Note 5 Smartphone among the consumers and incorporate the data for future researches on similar lines.

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