The Korea Herald is reporting that a very important happened today at Samsung’s headquarters in Seoul, Korea. They say that “the whole entourage of executives, including top managers Yoon Boo-keun and Shin Jong-kyun” met to discuss “Design 3.0”. It’s the company’s codename for their new design language. Samsung wants their products to stand out, and for them to elicit “positive values”.

This is where the news ends and my speculation begins.

I’d like to start by taking apart that codename. Design 1.0, I think, can be defined as all of Samsung’s products before the Galaxy S III was announced. Design 2.0 represents the multitude of devices, including the new S4, that are “nature inspired”. Thus Design 3.0 is something we’re going to see next year, assuming everything goes to plan.

Now I know you might be thinking what about Samsung’s other stuff? They make a bunch of things, not just phones. That’s where Shin Jong-kyun comes in. You know him better as J.K. Shin. If he was at this meeting, then you’ve got to think that mobile was a key talking point.

Apple famously launches a new design language for the iPhone every two years. That has many covering this industry expecting something completly new from Samsung in 2014. The fact that they’re having a meeting in late May to discuss “Design 3.0” has me worried, but then again maybe I underestimate how fast it takes Samsung to build around a production line.

Update: In a Forbes article published last month, one of Samsung’s key designers said this:

“Samsung Electronics Design Management Center declared ‘Design 3.0’ in 2011, and has since then been strengthening service design functions to implement ‘Design 3.0’. ‘Design 3.0’ is a third-phase design strategy that is aimed at creating new and meaningful product-service experiential value and lifestyles for users, thereby going beyond exterior style and convenient use.”