Samsung has today announced its financial results for the fourth quarter of 2012, which slightly exceed the estimations that were set by the Korean company earlier this month. It recorded an operating profit of 8.84 trillion won (approx. $8.27 billion) during the three-month period, on 56.06 trillion won (approx. $54.45 billion) in revenue. That’s a 10% increase in profit over the previous quarter, and a whopping 89.3% increase in profit over the fourth quarter of 2011.

Samsung vice president JK Shin has confirmed that the company will be announcing the Galaxy Note 8.0 at Mobile World Congress next month, but you don’t need to wait until then to see what it’ll look like. Thanks to these pictures of the device out in the wild, we can see that the iPad mini competitor looks a lot like a giant Galaxy S III, with a traditional button setup that’s unlike other Galaxy tablets.

Samsung has surpassed Apple as the world’s biggest buyer of semiconductors, according to Gartner. The Korean company’s hugely popular smartphones, such as the Galaxy S III and the Galaxy Note II, led to a 29% surge in chip purchases in 2012, taking its semiconductor spending past that of any other company.

The Samsung Galaxy S II’s Jelly Bean upgrade has finally begun its rollout in Spain today, reaching international handsets with the GT-I9100 model number. In addition to new Jelly Bean features like Google Now and Project Butter, the software brings Samsung’s latest “TouchWiz Nature UX,” which has been gracing the Korean company’s latest devices since the Galaxy S III launched in May 2012.

Speculation surrounding the Galaxy S IV, Samsung’s next flagship smartphone, traditionally ramps up around this time of the year. Everyone’s itching to know what the device will offer when it comes to features and specifications, and what it’ll look like. We’ve seen the rumors that offer questionable information from sources, but this picture, which was uploaded to Picasa almost a month ago, could be the Galaxy S IV’s first press shot.