Chinese tech major Huawei set to launch new tablets, PCs in India

Chinese tech major Huawei plans to bring new tablets and PCs to India in addition to the planned launch of its flagship Mate 20 Pro smartphone, a top company official said at its headquarters here.

In the smartphone business in India, Huawei has so far pushed its sub-brand Honor to compete in the affordable segment, but by bringing more Huawei-branded phones, it is now eyeing a greater pie in the premium segment as well which is currently dominated by OnePlus, Samsung and Apple.

It is not just the smartphone market in India that the Consumer Business Group division of Huawei is now focusing on.

"India is now a Tier-1 country for us and we will make new investments in the country to bring to the Indian consumers the benefits of new technology as early as possible," Jim Xu, Vice President, Huawei Consumer Business Group, told a visiting group of journalists.

"We are making strategic investments in the PC business. In the smartphone segment, Honor will continue to do their business as usual even as we plan to increase the presence of Huawei-branded phones," he added.

While Amazon is its online partner, Huawei will also look into forging a partnership for offline sales.

"We understand the importance of offline business. We may shortly open either exclusive Huawei brand shops or Huawei display zone or display desks in India," Xu said, adding that the company will initially be targeting the consumers in cities to promote the Huawei brand.

In the second quarter of this year, Huawei became the second-largest smartphone seller in the world after Samsung.

The Chinese telecommunications giant started its consumer devices business hardly a decade ago when it started selling its 3G dongle devices and today its product range includes smartphones, tablets, laptops, wearables, accessories as well as a number of smart home devices.

"It is very tough to build a global iconic brand from China," Xu said, adding that Huawei bucked the trend by focusing on quality of products and superior after sales services.

"Instead of focusing on advertising, we have put the emphasis on creating product differentiators by investing massively on research and development," he said.

In smartphones, these key differentiators include the battery life, supercharge technology, and high-quality photography, among others.

"Going ahead, Artificial Intelligence (AI) will completely change the smartphone experience for consumers. Today's smartphones will soon start looking like feature phones, compared to the intelligent phones of the future," he added.

Huawei PCs, on the other hand, are lightweight, portable and easy to use, Xu said.

The company, he added, is looking forward to bringing the technology edge that it has in smartphones to Huawei PCs and offer the consumers a complete digital eco-system that can make several tasks, including sharing of photos and files between devices, easier.

(Gokul Bhagabati is in Shenzhen at the invitation of Huawei Consumer Business Group. He can be contacted at gokul.b @ians.in)

(With inputs from agencies.)