MANILA -- Huawei will host a virtual product launch on Feb. 24, promising "seamless" artificial intelligence and teasing new devices, including the successor to its Mate X foldable smartphone.
Shenzhen-based Huawei, the world's largest dealer of telecommunications equipment, was supposed to showcase its new tech and products during Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Feb. 23, but the entire fair was canceled due to the coronavirus outbreak.
Huawei is launching new products 2 weeks after chief rival Samsung unveiled the Galaxy S20 series with revamped cameras to challenge the Chinese giant's P series. The successors to 2019's P30 and P30 Pro, believed to be called the P40 series, are due to be announced as early as March.
On its official Twitter page, Huawei Mobile teased an outline image of a folding device, with a form factor similar to 2019's Mate X, it's first commercially released foldable phone. The device will be "unprecedented," according to the post.
Samsung recently announced its second foldable phone, the Galaxy Z Flip, which opens and closes like a makeup compact unlike its predecessor, the Galaxy Fold, which has a tablet form factor.
In another post, Huawei posted the outline of a laptop, promising "borderless" technology. The company recently released the Matebook D 15 laptop with slim bezels.
Huawei last year moved to tighten connectivity of its devices, including smartphones, laptops, tablets, smartwatches and wireless earphones.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
BARCELONA - Flexible and folding formats framed the future of smartphones this week as manufacturers focused on new forms in an effort to jolt the market out of uniformity and re-invigorate sales.
But anyone hoping to tap or swipe Huawei's Mate X, a smartphone that wraps the screen around the front and back, was soon disappointed at Barcelona's Mobile World Congress.
Initial cheers were quickly followed by gasps when the Chinese firm revealed its eye-watering 2,299 euros ($2,600) price tag, although that includes a 5G connection.
This is even more than Samsung's Galaxy Fold, which was unveiled last week and will be priced from $1,980 when it goes on sale in some markets in April. It was on display in Barcelona in a glass case like a museum artifact.
While the hands-off stance indicates neither firm has a consumer-ready device, 2019 would be remembered as the year of the foldable Ben Wood, chief of research at CCS Insight, said, adding that the new format was still in its infancy.
"But we are at the stone age of devices with flexible displays; it's a whole new phase of experimentation after the sea of smartphone sameness we have seen for the last decade."
Samsung took the opposite approach to Huawei by putting its folding screen on the inside of its device, with another smaller screen on the front panel for use when its is closed.
"That was the solution we felt was best for longevity," Samsung's European Director of Mobile Portfolio & Commercial Strategy Mark Notton told Reuters.
Smartphone makers have been trying to innovate to persuade consumers to upgrade from devices which already meet most of their needs, in an effort to reverse falling sales.
And although more vendors will soon follow with their own takes on foldable displays, 2019 will not be the year they go mainstream, market analysts Canalys said. They will remain exclusively ultra-luxury devices with fewer than 2 million expected to be shipped worldwide this year, Canalys added.
The mobile market slipped 1.2 percent in 2018, research company Gartner says, although it expects growth of 1.6 percent in 2019, driven by replacement cycles in the largest and most saturated markets China, the United States and Western Europe.
GEARING UP FOR 5G
With 5G next generation mobile networks not becoming widely available until 2023 in the United States and China and 2026 in Europe, analysts say, the vast majority of customers will be buying the latest 4G devices like Samsung new Galaxy S10.
Nonetheless, manufacturers such as LG were keen to show they could squeeze 5G technology into 4G smartphone form, although most lacked launch or pricing information.
Chinese maker OnePlus had a 5G device running a video game using a 5G connection on show, but visitors were teased with only a glimpse of the phone's screen in a display cabinet.
"For us, launching means commercial availability, it doesn't mean PowerPoint," OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei told Reuters.
"We are confident we are going to be one of the first with a commercially available smartphone in Europe," he said, adding that this would be within the first half of 2019.
Xiaomi Corp, which ranked fifth in smartphone shipments in the last quarter according to IDC, did reveal pricing information along with its first 5G device.
"Xiaomi has fired the starting gun with a $599 price. That will bring tears to the eyes of many other mobile phone makers," Wood said, adding that many sub-scale makers such as Sony, LG and others could find it tough to make any kind of margin on 5G.
Sony did not show a 5G device, relying instead on its ownership of a major Hollywood studio to release a new line of Xperia phones with a 21:9 display ratio optimized to watch movies and Netflix content.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
MANILA -- Huawei launched its folding Mate X smartphone on Sunday, in a response to Samsung's Galaxy Fold, as it teased the arrival of its photography-centered P30 series in March.
Shenzen-based Huawei, the world's second largest smartphone maker also highlighted its 5G technology at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.
Huawei and market leader Samsung are racing to innovate in the smartphone space as sales cool, with consumers holding on to their handsets longer and avoiding the yearly upgrade cycle.
The Mate X folds out to reveal an 8-inch near borderless screen with no notch and no punch holes for the camera. Huawei consumer business CEO Richard Yu said it would be the fastest 5G device upon release.
When folded, the Mate X functions as a 6.6-inch smartphone.
"You can use this in any way, either you open it or you fold it. It's very convenient," he said. The design, inspired by the falcon's wing, took 3 years to develop, he said.
The Mate X's entire screen is visible even when folded unlike the Samsung Galaxy, which unfolds to reveal a tablet-like screen while keeping a smaller smartphone-style panel one one half of the device.
Aside from the Galaxy Fold, Samsung also unveiled last week its 10th generation S line, the Galaxy S10 Plus, S10 and the lower priced S10 e.
Huawei, on its Philippines Facebook page, teased the P30 Pro with a shot of the moon with the watermark slightly blurred. Leaks point to as many as 4 cameras on the rear of the P30 Pro.
The Galaxy S10 and S10 Plus and Xiaomi's Mi 9 have 3 rear cameras each on the rear.
Huawei also unveiled Sunday 5G WiFi devices for the home and on the go and its Matebook X Pro touchscreen notebook with a 91 percent screen-to-body ratio and a wider 3:2 aspect ratio.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
