Sergei Karpukhin/TASS
Huawei is having something of a rollercoaster year. Back in May, the U.S. doubled up on its blacklist, restricting Huawei’s access to the custom chips it has developed in recent years to power its 5G equipment and flagship smartphones. But then, just two months later, the company was celebrating its crowning achievement—overtaking Samsung to lead the world’s smartphone makers.
But, unfortunately for Huawei, it’s the tougher U.S. sanctions that look set to have a more lasting impact than second-quarter sales numbers shaped by the world’s recovery from coronavirus lockdowns and its own stellar growth in China.
There was confirmation of the implications of that U.S. move today, with Huawei’s consumer boss, Richard Yu, updating users with the news that the latest flagship, the Mate 40, will be released in the fall. That’s not the real news, though.
The real news is that the Mate 40 is likely the last flagship to carry the company’s brilliant Kirin chips, with the new Kirin 9000 onboard. Yu confirmed this at the 2020 Summit of the China Information Technology Conference on August 7.
The new U.S. restrictions kick in on September 15—that’s now some week in the American-Chinese calendar. Just a few days after Huawei’s restrictions take effect, there is the small matter of the new bans on TikTok and WeChat, absent any changes of ownership or U.S. changes of heart. For Huawei, though, there are unlikely to be any reversals.
There is a chance that the flux in Huawei’s purchase of silicon, and the work to replace its custom chips with off-the-shelf alternatives might limit availability of the Mate 40—another reason users will likely snap up the device. There is also a strong likelihood that almost all sales will be in China, satisfying local demand to keep its domestic rivals at bay.
So, should you you buy it? Yes. Huawei users (who can) should switch to this new flagship device, given it’s the last of its kind. The caveat to that, of course, is that the Mate 40 will not run Google software and services, so for those sticking to Huawei phones that do, you’ll likely hold off.
The Kirin 9000 represents the culmination of billions of dollars of investment in 5G and AI, with leading edge NPUs and GPUs onboard, but once its stock of those chips depletes, there will be no more available. For users who do buy the Mate 40, this will likely be a collectors’ piece—at least for the time being. We don’t yet know what we can expect from Huawei next year.
It was unclear before just how many chips Huawei had stockpiled or whether it had enough to carry itself through the Mate 40 and beyond—we now know the answer to that. Huawei’s consumer strategy was built around an end-to-end ecosystem, relying on its custom chips—that strategy is now being revised.
It remains unclear what the balance of this year holds for Huawei, but this latest update is a stark confirmation of U.S. sanctions now hitting hard. In the meantime, expect to see an even great flurry of “end of an era” excitement around the Mate 40 launch now.
The Link LonkAugust 08, 2020 at 02:10AM
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Huawei Just Gave Its Users A Reason To Switch Phones - Forbes
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