Samsung Electronics vice chairman Han Jong-hee used a shareholder meeting to apologise for a controversial game-optimising feature on its latest Galaxy S22 flagship series designed to prolong battery life and prevent overheating but which also significantly throttled performance, The Korea Herald reported.

Han is also co-CEO and head of the Device eXperience (DX) division, reportedly explained Samsung limited the functioning of the CPU and GPU to minimise overheating because delivering a consistent performance is crucial during high-end gaming.

“We were unable to properly consider our consumer’s needs,” The Korea Herald reported Han as saying.

The executive reportedly pledged to “listen to our users’ voices more carefully…so as not to repeat similar issues”.

With rising customer complaints, the smartphone giant last week released an update for the Galaxy S22 which allows users to override the game-optimising function to boost speeds, with the trade-off of reduced battery life. The update reportedly was only available in South Korea.

Han noted it will use a heat control algorithm to prevent overheating and will continue to add new functions, The Korea Herald wrote.

The newspaper noted the optimising software was first introduced in 2017 with the Galaxy S7 series, with users able to switch the feature off. The Galaxy S22 doesn’t have that option, resulting in sub-optimal performance compared with the device’s headline speed capability.

At the meeting, Kyung Kye-hyun, co-CEO and head of Samsung’s chip business, forecast the global semiconductor market to grow 9 per cent to more than $600 billion in 2022, Pulse News Korea reported.