Honor has announced its new flagship phone V40 5G in China. It is its first launch since Huawei sold off Honor to Shenzhen-based consortium of Chinese partners. The smartphone is likely to be available to the rest of the world under “View” branding.
Honor V40 5G specifications
The phone comes with a 6.72-inch OLED screen and is powered by a MediaTek Dimensity 1000+ processor and has a 120Hz refresh rate. Its 4,000mAh battery can be also be charged wirelessly. The primary camera has a 1/1.56-inch 50-megapixel sensor.
V40 is available in China with prices starting at 3,599 yuan for a model with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage. 3,999 yuan (~$620) doubles the storage to 256GB.
Huawei sold Honor in November after facing challenges in securing the adequate supply chain and US trade sanctions with China. Although Honor operated independently but relied on Huawei for its technology HiSense’s Kirin processor. After the parent company was hit hard by US sanctions banning US companies from doing business, Honor faced several hurdles
Now as Huawei has sold of Honor, it can utilize Google Services to make way for “View 40” version of the V40 in the international market. With this disinvestment Honor no longer has to depend on Huawei’s AppGallery, which still can’t compete with Google’s Play Store outside of China, where Google has no presence.
Since Honor no longer can utilize Huawei’ supply chain it has to work on its own to reach the Western smartphone market and establish itself as a strong brand on its own when the phone is launched in the rest of the world.
