On December 23, Huawei officially released its latest folding screen mobile phone, Huawei P50 Pocket. Despite the current difficult external environment, Huawei hopes to further consolidate its advantages in the high-end smartphone market with its years of scientific and technological research and development strength and continuous innovation in folding screen technology.
Folding screen mobile phone due to its high research and development difficulties, has been the most high-end, the most flagship product representative of various manufacturers. According to the "2021 China Folding Screen Mobile Phone Market Insight Report" released by iResearch Consulting Research Institute, Huawei's share of China's folding screen market will account for 64% in 2021.
Yu Chengdong, managing director of Huawei, CEO of Consumer BG, and CEO of Huawei's smart car solution BU, said at the press conference that the number of HarmonyOS-equipped devices has exceeded 220 million, and HarmonyOSConnect will ship more than 100 million new ecological devices in 2021, becoming the fastest growing operating system.
Yu Chengdong introduced that huawei P50 Pocket adopts Vientiane double ring design, which is a lens module and circular external screen stacked up and down.
Yu Chengdong, Managing Director of Huawei, CEO of Consumer BG, and CEO of Huawei Smart Vehicle Solution BU
It is reported that P50 Pocket as Huawei's first vertical folding mobile phone, a long time ago began to plan, three years of "from 0 to have", in the R & D investment and all aspects of the industrial chain Huawei's investment is very large, P50 Pocket is also Huawei from 2019 released the world's first folding screen mobile phone Huawei Mate X, in the folding screen mobile phone technology in the past three years to accumulate and explore a comprehensive embodiment.
Industry insiders said that folding screen mobile phones are products that rely heavily on the underlying technology, with extremely high technical density and industrial value. As a technology-driven technology manufacturer, Huawei has entered the folding screen very early, and has repeatedly brought the first technology to promote the folding screen market and continue to innovate to lead the rapid development of the industry.
At present, after several years of consumer market cultivation, as well as the continuous iteration and maturity of technology, the production capacity and user experience of folding screen mobile phones are increasing, the market demand has increased significantly, and the folding screen mobile phone market is gradually moving from a niche market that seeks novelty and difference to a popular market.
According to data from panel supply chain research (DSCC), global folding screen mobile phone shipments in the third quarter of this year exceeded the previous four quarters combined, up 215% month-on-month and 480% year-on-year to 2.6 million units. DSCC forecasts that global foldable smartphone shipments will also hit record highs in the current fourth quarter, expecting a 47% sequential increase and a year-over-year increase of more than 450% to 3.8 million units. For 2022, DSCC has raised its forecast to 17.5 million foldable smartphones.
Based on this, more and more manufacturers, including Xiaomi, have entered the folding screen mobile phone market, hoping to get a piece of the pie. But there are still challenges in really making an impact in this area. According to data from iResearch Consulting Research Institute, the price of folding screen mobile phones far exceeds the average price of global smartphones by several times. The price of folding screen mobile phones basically belongs to the gear above 8000. This is the lowest price for consumer tolerance, and the only brands that are stable at this price are Currently Huawei and Apple. According to international data agency IDC, in the first quarter of 2021, Apple and Huawei together held 96% of the market share in China's more than $800 market segment. Although several other domestic mobile phone manufacturers have tried to expand their share in the high-end mobile phone market this year, they have achieved little at present.
In this context, Huawei hopes to further consolidate its advantages in the domestic high-end mobile phone market through P50Pocket. It is reported that Huawei P50 Pocket new products, combined with scientific and technological innovation and Huawei P series mobile phones of the two genes, hope to combine scientific and technological aesthetics and technological innovation can be combined. For example, one of the keywords of the P series is smart photography, and this time Huawei P50Pocket brings a hyperspectral imaging system, which can not only make the portrait more divided, but also have the fun gameplay of fluorescent photography. When the folding machine is folded up, it is two layers, thicker than the traditional bar machine, and after unfolding, it is a single layer, much thinner than the straight plate machine, and in this extreme thickness case, Huawei has been exploring how to do photography better. On the one hand, it is necessary to innovate hardware, but also need to exert efforts on software, and use Huawei's algorithms to combine with innovative hardware to create a better camera and video experience on these soft features such as primary color engines and computational optics.