By Miyoung Kim

SEOUL (Reuters) – Samsung Electronics Co launches its latest Galaxy S smartphone in Europe on Tuesday, with the third generation model expected to be even more successful than its predecessor, which helped the South Korean company topple Apple Inc as the world’s top smartphone maker.

The S3, which tracks the user’s eye movements to keep the screen from dimming or turning off while in use, hits stores in 28 European and Middle East countries, including Germany and Britain, as Samsung aims to widen the gap with Apple months ahead of its rival’s new iPhone, expected in the third quarter.

The Galaxy S3, running on Google’s Android operating system, boasts a 4.8-inch screen, bigger than the 3.5-inch display on the iPhone 4S and the 4.7-inch screen on HTC’s One X model.

In the kind of anticipation that has become the norm for new Apple gadget releases, hopeful customers began queuing outside an electronics retail store in Berlin on Monday night eager to be the first to lay their hands on the S3.

(Additional reporting by Paul Sandle in LONDON and Tarmo Virki in HELSINKI; Editing by Ryan Woo and Ian Geoghegan)

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