Huawei Mate X: Chinese Firm Shares The Release Strategy For The New 5G Folding Phone

Huawei, a Chinese smartphone giant, this week, announced that its latest foldable phone, the Huawei Mate X, is now available for preorder in the Chinese market and delivery will start on November 15. However, the new smartphone comes at the premium price tag -- around $2406 for the version with 5G support, 8GB of RAM and 512GB of storage option. That costs more than the latest foldable phone competition, the Samsung Galaxy Fold.

Huawei first introduced the Huawei Mate X foldable phone at the recent Mobile World Congress 2019 event on Feb. 25, 2019. The new foldable smartphone was, originally, scheduled for launch in June 2019. However, the Chinese firm delayed the release date to allow for extensive testing in light of the failures and defects reported by users of the Samsung Galaxy Fold. Now, the rival device is ready for a mobile rumble and it looks like the Chinese firm is also working on the release date.

At the recent IFA 2019 event, Huawei consumer business group CEO Richard Yu also confirmed to the media that the Chinese firm wanted to launch the new Huawei Mate X in August. However, the planned release date was pushed back due to some technical difficulties.

This two-in-one, Android-based foldable phone is the first from the Chinese smartphone company and is most likely the biggest mobile rival that Samsung has in this new mobile form factor market.

For starters, Huawei Mate X is a 5G-enabled smartphone equipped with the company’s very own Huawei Kirin 980 mobile chip and Huawei Barong 5000 modem. It comes with 8GB of RAM along with 512GB of internal storage (UFS 2.1 storage). Powering the device is a dual-cell 4500mAh battery that can quick charge with 55W fast charging.

The new Huawei Mate X features an 8-inches OLED display that can be folded outwards, resulting in a 6.3-inch rear display and a 6.67-inch main display. This new foldable phone is covered by plastic material and is secured by a push-button latch when the device is closed.

As for the camera setup, the Mate X comes with a 40-megapixel main camera system, a 16-megapixel wide-angle lens, and an 8-megapixel telephoto lens and a time-of-flight (ToF) sensor. Unlike the Samsung Galaxy Fold, the Huawei Mate X’s screen wraps around the outside of the device, which makes it more usable as a conventional phone than its closest rival. However, the plastic-covered screen faces a huge durability challenge for the company.

In addition, the Chinese smartphone company is also planning an upgrade of the device chipset. Huawei business group CEO Yu said, in a recent media conversation, that the Huawei Mate X with the Kirin 980 processor will be launched first followed by a new version with the new Huawei Kirin 990. The Chinese company also plans an upgrade of the current Android 9 Pie operating system to the latest Android 10 mobile OS.

As for the worldwide availability, the Huawei Mate X will be made available first to the Chinese smartphone users. The worldwide availability is still under review and yet to be announced by the Chinese company. In a recent conversation with The Verge, the Chinese firm stated that the launch strategy is based on carriers’ 5G roll out in different regions.