China's Huawei Technologies said on Thursday it will hold a media event to discuss new products on Sept. 25, fanning expectations that details about recently released smartphones will be revealed.
Its Mate 60 series is in the spotlight - both for the use of
a China-made advanced chip and because the series likely marks the first major
attempt by Huawei's smartphone business to come back from crippling U.S.
sanctions.
Huawei did not elaborate on the new products that will be
discussed but domestic business daily Yicai reported that information about its
latest phones will be disclosed.
Huawei started selling its latest high-end smartphones Mate
60 and Mate 60 Pro at the end of last month and last week it started presales
for its Mate 60 Pro+ smartphone alongside a new foldable phone Mate X5.
The series' launch was unusual in that Huawei did not carry
out any pre-marketing or organise a glitzy event. Even so, the phones have
caused a stir, with the first sales coinciding with a trip to China by U.S.
Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and because the Pro version was found to be
using a 5G-capable chip made by a Chinese company.
How Huawei's phones will fare against Apple (AAPL.O) at a
time of heightened U.S.-Sino tensions will be of much interest to investors and
China watchers.
The launch of Apple's iPhone 15 series this week has drawn
mixed reactions in China - the company's third-largest market - with many
online users liking its faster chip and improved gaming capabilities while
others preferred Huawei's new smartphone.
Further denting Apple's sheen in China, the government has
expanded curbs on the use of iPhones by state employees, with some told not to
use them at work.
The state-backed Securities Times this week reported that
Huawei had raised its Mate 60 series second-half shipment target by 20% due to
better-than-expected sales.
Huawei, once the world's largest smartphone maker, saw that
business decimated after the U.S. started restricting tech exports to the
company in 2019.
The U.S. and other Western governments have labelled Huawei
a security risk, a charge the company denies. Since then, Huawei has only sold
limited batches of 5G models using stockpiled chips.
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