Even the mainstream media has started to chime in on the prospects for the successor to Samsung’s Galaxy S3. This time, Reuters – citing UBS analyst Nicolas Gaudois – reports that the South Korean manufacturer could pack a display panel that uses an unbreakable plastic substrate in the Galaxy S4.

Supposedly, preparations are being made for the mass-production of these parts, with an eye towards a release in the first half of the year. This time frame will be dominated by Samsung’s products at the high-end, while devices in other categories would follow later in the year. The Galaxy S4 has been forecast by a variety of tech watchers for release sometime in March or April next year, dependent on supplies of key components like the alleged 5-inch full HD display.

Stanford Bernstein analyst Mark Newman largely concurred on the high likelihood of unbreakable or even flexible displays in Samsung’s high-end devices within the next two years. OLED-based screens have been defining components of the South Korean manufacturer’s flagship handsets over the past few generations, and there have been numerous demonstrations of flexible displays based on this technology.

Samsung is already the biggest supplier of mobile phones in the world, and its final frontier is to break through the premium market segment that has been dominated by Apple, especially in the United States.

Going by UBS’ forecast of Galaxy S3 and Galaxy Note 2 sales, Samsung may just be able to make some decent progress on this front. The South Korean firm should just about be able to sell 22.5 million of its highest-end smartphones in the fourth quarter of the year, leading up to a possible fifth straight quarter of record profits.