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Huawei
China’s Huawei will unveil its new Honor 7 phone on June 30, according to a teaser poster displayed on the Weibo website.
The poster reveals the name Honor with the shape of the number seven, indicating the model number. The date of June 30 is listed at the bottom, a tipoff that the phone will be announced on that date. But perhaps the most intriguing part of the image is the fingerprint seen in the middle, a sign that the new Model 7 will come packed with a fingerprint sensor.
Huawei’s smartphone market share in China jumped in the first quarter to 11.4 percent from 7.8 percent in the same quarter in 2014, according to research firm International Data Corporation (IDC). But the company trailed Xiaomi as well as Apple, which scored the top spot in the country thanks to the new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus.
Huawei’s strategy to challenge rivals and gain new customers is to focus on more high-end smartphones. Apple already offers fingerprint recognition on its iPhone. Xiaomi’s upcoming Mi 5 phone will also sport a fingerprint sensor, according to previous reports. Adding fingerprint recognition to the Honor 7 is one way to compete on the high-end market.
The Honor 7 will be made from aircraft-grade metal, says blog site GSMArena, and sport a 5-inch, 1920 pixel by 1080 pixel display. The phone may roll out in two different versions, according to fellow blog site Gizmo China. One version would come with 16 gigabytes of onboard storage and 3GB of RAM, while the higher-end edition would pack in 64 gigabytes of storage and 4GB of RAM. The 13-megapixel rear camera would come with autofocus and and LED flash.
Huawei has been diving into fingerprint recognition with its 6-inch Ascend Mate 7 phablet . But a fingerprint sensor on the Honor 7 would present an upgrade from the 5-inch Honor 6 phone , which launched late last year.
Huawei will likely use the June 30 day to unveil the phone as well as reveal its price tag and availability.
