China’s Huawei, which is struggling to gain traction with smartphone carriers, is planning a rockband-style global launch in London for its new Ascend P6 smartphone, as it seeks to join Samsung and Apple as a major mobile innovator.
The Ascend P6 made its debut on June 18 at London’s Roundhouse, a performing-arts venue that has hosted concerts by bands including The Doors and Led Zeppelin.
The outcome of the London event and subsequent sales of the P6 could determine the future of Huawei’s smartphone business, at a time when its core telecom-equipment business faces more challenges because of security concerns in the US, UK and Australia.
“We expect the Ascend P6 to work miracles,” said Richard Yu, who heads Huawei’s consumer-business group, in a recent post.
The Android OS smartphone comes with a 4.7-inch 720p HD display, quad-core processor and is 6.4mm thick.
In Australia, it’s not only the Federal Government which has snubbed the Chinese manufacturer. Vodafone, Optus and Telstra have not ranged the company’s new smartphones, which are primarily sold via Harvey Norman.
The Chinese company, which was banned from working on Australia’s National Broadband Network, is now trying to shake off its image as a stalking horse for Chinese spies, according to the ABC.
Banned from tendering for the NBN network, Huawei has refuted claims by the US House Intelligence Committee that the company could potentially build so-called “backdoors” into the likes of the NBN to allow for Chinese eavesdropping.
The committee claimed Huawei could even shut down such a system remotely during a time of war.
But the company’s corporate senior vice president, Chen Lifang told the ABC that even if her company wanted to use its technology to secretly eavesdrop, it could not.
“It’s impossible for Huawei to install any backdoors or vulnerabilities into our products. This is not only verified by ourselves, but also third parties,” she said.
