Energized Huawei holds event in front of excited fans revealing a new phone, tablets, and more
Today was going to be the day that Huawei would tell us how it managed to skirt U.S. restrictions and with China's largest foundry, SMIC, create a new 7nm 5G Kirin chipset that it uses on the Mate 60 Pro. U.S. government officials and lawmakers were eagerly waiting for Huawei to reveal its secrets since the manufacturer is not allowed to obtain cutting-edge chips from any foundry that uses American technology to manufacture them.
The last two flagship series that Huawei released, last year's Mate 50 line and this year's P60 and P60 Pro, were powered by the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 chipset tweaked not to work with 5G. Huawei obtained a license from the U.S. Commerce Department to use those chips which couldn't be considered cutting-edge because of their lack of 5G support.
So when Huawei introduced the Mate 60 Pro with its own Kirin 9000s 5G chip at the end of August, there were many questions about the component that the U.S. wanted answered. After all, these were the first phones announced by Huawei powered by a homegrown 5G Kirin chip since 2020's Mate 40 line.
When Huawei announced that it would hold a new product event on September 25th, it was hoped that the company would explain how it was able to source 5G chips from SMIC even though, at 7nm, they were two generations behind the most cutting-edge 3nm A17 Pro chipset built for Apple by TSMC. Instead, Huawei observed radio silence about the Mate 60 Pro with consumer chief Richard Yu stating that it will increase smartphone production thanks to a rise in demand.
Huawei announces the Mate 60 RS Ultimate Design
During the event, Huawei briefly announced the Mate 60 RS Ultimate Design model and quickly displayed an image of the phone with its octagon-shaped rear camera module. This would have had the Porsche Design moniker applied to it in the past, but the partnership between Huawei and Porsche has been discontinued. The phone now appears on e-commerce site Vmall.
The Mate 60 RS Ultimate Design has the same specs as the Mate 60 Pro+ including a 6.82-inch OLED display, the Kirin 9000s chipset, a triple camera setup on the ceramic back, and a 5000mAh battery. Available in Red and Black, the phone is offered with 16GB RAM and 512GB of storage for CNY 11,999 ($1,641) and with 16GB RAM and 1TB of storage for CNY 12,999 ($1,778). Sales will start later this month.
During the event, Huawei revealed a new pair of earbuds that uses a homegrown Kirin chip, new smartwatches, and new flagship MatePad tablets. Yu was on stage during the live presentation comparing the MatePad Pro with the iPad Pro. With Huawei fans in the audience cheering on the company, it seems that the firm has been energized and is ready to once again take on Apple, Samsung, and all other competitors.
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