Samsung's Galaxy S3 flagship smartphone has been less than four months on the market, but a Galaxy S4 is reportedly in the cards already.

According to a Korea Times report on Sunday, Sept. 16, citing unnamed company officials and local part suppliers, Samsung Electronics plans to introduce the Galaxy S3 successor at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2013, which takes place in February. Speaking under condition of anonymity, a company official told the publication that Samsung is "ready" to unveil the Galaxy S4 in Barcelona next year, and the new handset is expected to go on sale globally the following month at the latest.

The news of a Galaxy S3 successor comes just days after Samsung's archrival, Apple, introduced its new iPhone 5.

The Samsung Galaxy S3 is already wildly popular, with sales reportedly hitting the 20 million mark in just over three months of its launch, the company reported in early September. According to The Korea Times' source, the new Galaxy S4 is expected to be the company's most powerful handset in terms of both hardware specifications and software advancement.

The unnamed Samsung official said that the S4 would "definitely use" LTE (Long-Term Evolution), as well as Samsung's in-house quad-core Exynos application processors and quad-core chips. The screen size is expected to sport a slight increase from the 4.8-inch display on the current flagship to a 5-inch screen on the Galaxy S4. The next-generation smartphone will also use Google's Android software and feature OLED (organic light emitting diode) displays, noted the official.

"Samsung wants to keep its one-year product schedule and the Galaxy S IV will be the first to match that strategy. The S IV will see some external changes but retain its popular rectangular shape with rounded corner concept," an official from one of Samsung's local supply partners told The Korea Times. This news follows last month's reports that Samsung is in talks with major U.S. carriers to apply modified phone designs in a bid to avoid patent infringement.

Keep in mind, however, that none of this has been officially confirmed, so they remain in the rumor state for now. Samsung said it "cannot comment on rumor or speculation."