Samsung donates $5 million to India in support of COVID-19 relief

As reported by SamMobile, Samsung has made a donation of $2.64 million to the Union and State governments in India, with an additional donation of $658,000 planned for the states of Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. Those states alone contain about 272 million people, with 1,864 being currently confirmed to be infected with the virus, according to data reports from Wikipedia and the World Health Organization.

Samsung has also donated $1.97 million to India's PM Cares Fund, established last month with goals to combat and contain the coronavirus outbreak and any future pandemics, with the current Indian Prime Minister serving as chairman. In addition, Samsung Pay has been recently updated to let Indian citizens contribute to the fund directly, through their Galaxy smartphones and tablets.

The South Korean giant has previously donated numerous supplies to local hospitals, including face masks, gloves, infrared thermometers and air purifiers. In a similar move to Apple, Samsung is now too matching its employees' donations to fighting the coronavirus.

Previously, we have reported on Apple also donating 10 million masks to the US and some of the most affected regions in Europe, along with over $7 million to coronavirus recovery efforts in China, with CEO Tim Cook actively showing support towards the country during the difficult times.

India is one of the world's biggest smartphone markets, with Samsung being its top selling brand many years in a row, occasionally to be surpassed by Xiaomi. And as the Indian market grows exponentially, many smartphone manufacturers are increasing their efforts to establish their presence on it.

In Q4 of 2019, Samsung was India's second best-selling smartphone brand, just behind Xiaomi, according to analysis by the Canalys firm, based on sell-in shipments.