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MWC 2021 day one wrap-up
“It is great that MWC is back,” Samsung UK’s James Kitto said, opening up this year’s presser. “And behalf of everyone at Samsung, it’s great to be back at MWC.”
What, precisely, it means to be “back” in 2021 is another question entirely. Samsung was, of course, one of a number of major industry players who announced that they would not be exhibiting at this year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. It was hard not to see an echo of last year’s event, when key players pulled out, one by one, forcing the GSMA to cancel the event altogether.
This year’s event is different for myriad reasons. For one thing, MWC’s traditional timeframe of late-February/early-March put the event directly in the crosshairs of COVID-19’s arrival in the EU. For another, this time out, the organizing body had another year to prepare.
The simplest route would have been to do what the CTA did with CES and go all-virtual. The first all-virtual CES had plenty of issues of course, but attempting an in-person element ahead of a widespread vaccine rollout in the U.S. would have, at best, complicated things by orders of magnitude.
COVID-19 continues to be a concern in Spain – as with much of the world. The GSMA opted to go ahead with the event this year, however, after pushing MWC back several months from its standard dates. The company has implemented all sorts of safety measures, but judging from early videos taken at the event, social distancing ought not to prove an issue on the show floor this year.
Image Credits: Samsung/Google
It seems safe to assume that most who are “attending” the event are doing so virtually – a list that includes the vendors themselves.
Samsung is among those high profile companies that presented a pre-recorded virtual press conference. Perhaps companies still see value in being attached to this sort of event even if it’s virtual, or maybe the on-going partnership with the organization is worth nurturing. The cynical part of me wonders how many of the sponsored sessions just couldn’t be reversed.
Samsung’s event was arguably the biggest of the day, but the presser felt like little more than a placeholder. The biggest news of the press conference was an expansion of a partnership Google announced at I/O last month, while much of the rest of the stream was pointing toward an Unpacked event happening later this summer.
Image Credits: Samsung
In fact, the event closed with a black and white slide reading “See you soon at the next Unpacked,” in case you didn’t get the hint. Bottom line: no hardware.
Lenovo, on the other hand, didn’t hold back. That’s due, in part, to the fact that the company releases a tremendous amount of hardware, so why not tie it to MWC, right?
The list of announcements inluces a new version of the Smart Clock Google Assistant alarm clock with a built-in wireless charging pads for phones and several tablets, including the Yoga Tab 11 and 13, which sport combination hanger/kickstand. The 13-inch system also doubles as an external monitor, which is when the kickstand really comes in handy.
Image Credits: Lenovo
TCL got out ahead of the event early, with the announcement of NXTWEAR G – a wearable OLED cinema display. The headmounted device approximates a 140-inch display with a 16:9 aspect ratio. The company also offered a better look at the 20 Pro 5G, which is coming to the States at just a dollar short of $500, featuring a snapdragon 750G processor and a headphone jack to boot.
TCL NEXTWEAR G
Those are your top line headlines for the show so far. The event runs through July 1st, so still plenty of show left, whether or not anyone will be there to see it in person.
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Rollables are the new foldables
Smartphone sales are bad — and have been for a couple of years now. Certainly this ongoing pandemic hasn’t helped. All the talk about how 5G and new form factors were going to cause a kind of bounce-back all fell by the wayside, as people put a pause on unnecessary luxuries.
Samsung is the only company that’s seen some success with the foldable form factor, and that whole thing got off to a…rough start. There were plenty of technical issues at first, leading to a less than auspicious first impression. These days, price continues to be a major hurdle — especially during a time when paying $1,000 and up on a phone is a major red flag for many.
In the world of phone form factors, two is, at the very least, the start of a trend. And on day one of CES both LG and TCL have offered their take on yet another form factor designed to offer more screen real estate in pocketable devices.
Image Credits: TCL
LG’s product is — for the moment — the more notable of the two, largely because the company plans to actually release the thing. In an interview published this morning, spokesperson Ken Hong told Nikkei, “As it is released at CES 2021, I can tell that it will be launched this year.”
And, indeed, LG’s a company not afraid to take chances with a wacky form factor. There are a number of examples of the phenomenon in recent years, most notably the swiveling screen on the LG Wing.
Still, the product didn’t amount to much more than a brief tease during a press conference (an excuse to transition between scenes, really), so you’d be forgiven for assuming that the tech still has a long way to go.
TCL, meanwhile, noted up front that the product is still firmly in the concept phase, but managed to give us a better look. I suppose it’s easier to parade concept than an unfinished real-world product. Details are still slim, but the company says the device is capable of expanding from 6.7 to 7.8 inches.
One imagines — or, at least, hopes — that the industry has learned from the issues stemming from the first batch of foldables. Sometimes the race to bring technology to market results in delivering something half-baked, an issue that came back to bite companies like Samsung and Motorola. Lab testing is one thing — the real world is a different thing entirely.
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TCL announces a $400 5G handset
What’s most remarkable about the push for 5G is how quickly the prices came down on handsets sporting the next-gen wireless technology. The push toward affordable 5G devices is clearly as much an indicator as the current state of the smartphone space as anything — people just aren’t upgrading devices as quickly as they used to. And even more to the point, they’re reluctant to pay $1,000 when they do.
Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 765G has been a piece of that puzzle. And unsurprisingly, the mid-tier chip found in TCL’s new $400 5G handset. Of course, TCL is positioning it as “under-$400” with that $399.99 price tag, which is technically correct — the best kind of correct.
It’s also not really right to say that the TCL 10 5G UW’s a “premium blend of performance, power, stylish design and 5G connectivity that until now has only been available on more expensive flagship smartphones.” Affordable 5G handsets aren’t an entirely new phenomenon — nor are affordable 5G handsets with decent specs and design. But even so, the price point is still notable at this stage in the 5G upgrade cycle — which, frankly, is why we’re writing about it here.
The price/5G combo is the main thing to like here, coming in at even less than, say, the OnePlus Nord, a recent high-water mark in the 5G/price point combo. And there are a few other things that should appeal to potential buyers, as well, including a 4,500mAh battery coupled with reverse charging for other devices. There are three rear-facing cameras: a 48-megapixel main, an eight-megapixel ultra wide and a five-megapixel macro, the latter of which is starting to appear on more phones.
It arrives October 29, and is, notably, a Verizon (TechCrunch’s parent company) exclusive here in the U.S., using the carrier’s mmWave technology.
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BlackBerry’s smartphone brand switches hands again, set to return as a 5G Android handset
A good brand is hard to kill. Over the past several years, the smartphone space has seen a resurgence of once-mighty mobile brands making a comeback with various degrees of success. HMD’s Nokia phones are probably the best and most successful example, but even Palm had a brief moment in the sun.
And then there’s the case of BlackBerry. TCL surprised the mobile world by bringing the brand raring back with an Android handset that re-embraced the QWERTY keyboard. That, in and of itself, wasn’t enough, of course. But TCL has the chops to deliver quality hardware, and certainly did so with the KeyOne. I know I was surprised the first time I saw one in person behind the scenes at CES a few years back.
Early this year, TCL announced the end of the partnership, noting, “We… regret to share… that as of August 31, 2020, TCL Communication will no longer be selling BlackBerry-branded mobile devices.” From its phrasing, it seemed like a less than amicable end for the deal. But TCL has already moved on to producing devices under its own brand name after years of subsidiaries and branded deals.
All of which brings us to this week’s announcement that a company you’ve never heard of, called OnwardMobility, is bringing the BlackBerry name to hardware for North America and Europe (other branding deals have existed in other markets). It’s a strange deal for starters, due to the fact that OnwardMobility is hardly a household name. It’s based in Austin, Texas, has fewer than 50 employees and was founded in March of last year, perhaps with such a partnership in mind.
After all, while a branding deal is far from a guaranteed recipe for success, it is, at least, a way of getting that first foot through the door. I’m not really sure I would be writing anything about OnwardMobility for TechCrunch dot com at the moment, were it not for the promise of reviving the BlackBerry name yet again. So that’s something. The company’s staff also notably involves some former TCL folk, as well as people involved with the BlackBerry software side of things. Another name that pops up a lot is Sonim Technologies, another Austin-based company that is a subsidiary of a Shenzhen-based brand of the same name. They largely specialize in rugged devices for first responders.
CEO Peter Franklin has both Microsoft and Zynga on his resume, and produced this fairly low-fi YouTube video to explain the company’s mission:
OnwardMobility says it’s a standalone startup. No word yet on investments or investors, though it will certainly be interesting to find out who’s backing this latest push to make the BlackBerry name relevant again. Notably, the company’s not sharing renders yet, either, but says it’s bringing a 5G device to market in 2021, with a physical keyboard and the focus on security that’s long been a key differentiator for the BlackBerry brand.
BlackBerry (the software company) certainly seems to be on board with its new partner here. CEO John Chen had this to say about the deal:
BlackBerry is thrilled OnwardMobility will deliver a BlackBerry 5G smartphone device with physical keyboard leveraging our high standards of trust and security synonymous with our brand. We are excited that customers will experience the enterprise and government level security and mobile productivity the new BlackBerry 5G smartphone will offer.
More or less what you’d anticipate on that front. For now, the news is basically OnwardMobility’s entry onto the scene and announcement of its BlackBerry licensing deal. I’m honestly not sure how much clout the BlackBerry name holds in 2020 — nor do I necessarily believe there’s a critical mass of consumers clamoring to return to the physical keyboard. So OnwardMobility has a lot to prove in an extremely crowded mobile market. I guess we’ll see what it has to offer next year. Stay tuned.
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TCL riffs on the foldable format with a pair of prototypes
Those TCL concept phones that were set for Mobile World Congress have finally arrived in prototype form. The Chinese hardware maker showcased a pair of devices this week, including one that saw a brief unveiling during a CES event.
The usual concept caveat certainly applies here. As with concept cars, TCL is clearly gauging consumer interest in certain design elements for the product. And while I’m usually not a fan of dead-end concept devices, there’s something to be said for approaching the foldable category with the same sort of caution you would use to open and close the original Galaxy Fold.
The tri-fold is the product we caught a glimpse of back in January. The name betrays the concept a bit. The device has three screens and two folding mechanisms. That makes for a pretty massively beefy phone when closed, but a luxurious (dual-creased) 10-inch tablet when unfurled.
There’s already some skepticism around how eager users will ultimately be in adopting this technology, and I don’t see effectively double the footprint (and, for that matter, the potential points of failure) as a particularly engaging solution, as nice as it might be to stick a 10-inch tablet in my pocket.
The slide-out device is nothing if not more compelling, allowing the user to essentially pull out the screen for more real estate. That addresses, certainly, hinge and crease issues, but it’s impossible to see if it’s any more robust.
There’s apparently a working unit somewhere in a lab on the other side of the world, but we’re all understandably skeptical until we can get one in our hands.
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Images of TCL’s slide-out display smartphone surface in wake of MWC cancellation
This morning brought a look at some of what we’re missing at this year’s Mobile World Congress. The show may have been called off on account of coronavirus concerns, but the news goes on.
We knew that TCL was planning to show off a number of “alternative” smartphone form factors, and one just showed up on CNET. The device presents a promising take on the world of expandable screens, with a kind of slide-out display that expands the standard smartphone into something more akin to a tablet.
TCL, of course, showed off its own foldable at MWC last year, but the device was encased in a block of glass. By all accounts, the company’s decision to not rush to market was a good one, as foldables have not gotten off to the most auspicious of starts.
The sources behind the images say that the device would have debuted at MWC, though it’s hard to judge how far along the technology is, given the fact that these are, indeed, renders. If I had to venture a guess, I’d say that best-case scenario, it would have been another under-glass, hands-off debut. These days, it seems that manufacturers are increasingly following the automotive model of showing off early concepts that may or may not ever actually come to market. The word “prototype” certainly seems apt in this case.
In either case, a TCL rep declined to offer TechCrunch a comment on the images or whether we’ll get a better look in spite of the show’s cancellation.
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TCL teases a 5G device, headset and its first foldable at CES
TCL is hardly a household name in the smartphone space. That’s hardly surprising, however, as the Chinese electronics company is better known for sub-brands like Alcatel and BlackBerry (hardware, not software — long story). Late last year, the company began really pushing its branded devices in Europe, a strategy it’s set to expand upon with some more cutting-edge devices.
The company’s been teasing the launch of both 5G and foldable handsets since last year, and is finally offering a little more info — on the former, at least. The TCL 10 5G will be its first 5G handset, following the release of an Alcatel-branded router last year. The device is set for a Q2 launch in the U.S. and Canada.
It’s one of three TCL 10 devices set for launch, with pricing on the line starting at less than $500. It’s clear that budget will continue to be a primary selling point for the line, though one assumes the 5G model will carry a not-insignificant premium on top of that. The device will be powered by Qualcomm’s 5G SoC line. The chipmaker introduced the 765 late last year, with the intent of offering a more affordable entry-point for the next-gen wireless technology.
And then there’s the matter of the foldable. At press time, we don’t have much information about the device, first alluded to at last year’s Mobile World Congress. What we do have, however, are a lot more renders. The fact that it’s still listed as “Foldable Smartphone Concept” doesn’t give one a lot of confidence that it’s ready for prime time.
The images do, however, point to a form factor similar to Samsung’s Galaxy Fold, along with what appears to be a quartet of rear-facing cameras. More information, one assumes, at Mobile World Congress late next month. So, something to look forward to in Barcelona, I guess.
And who can forgot Project Archery? Just kidding. Forgetting it would require that you’ve heard about it in the first place. I’m going to go out on a limb and say probably you have not. The device was announced — or, rather, alluded to — at last year’s IFA. It’s a wearable display with a “cinematic viewing experience.” We’ve seen those come and go over the years. TCL’s shown off the 2.0 version of the product, but offered up no additional information.
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TCL adopts Tempow’s multi-device Bluetooth streaming tech
Here’s an interesting bit of news out of IFA today. TCL this morning announced a deal with Tempow that will bring the French company’s clever Bluetooth streaming protocol to its forthcoming Plex flagship device.
TCL follows Motorola in adopting the Tempow Audio Profile (TAP) technology. The protocol, which Tempow showed off a few IFAs back, is software-based, allowing devices to stream to multiple Bluetooth headphones and speakers simultaneously.
The company has clearly gained notice, raising a $4 million funding round back in March of 2018. As Romain noted in his write up of that news, more than five million devices are using Tempow’s stack, with the Moto X4 leading the way.
TCL and Tempow are making no bones about who they’re going after with this one. A press release touting the news mentions Apple several times, clearly targeting the chips that form the connections between its handsets and headphones/speakers. (Surely the news arriving a week before the new iPhones is a key part of that positioning.)
“There is a significant movement across mobile manufacturers to innovate and unlock the true potential of Bluetooth – the most recent example being Apple’s rumored Audio Sharing in iOS13,” said Tempow CEO Vincent Nallatamby said in a release. “What TCL built with Tempow far outstrips Apple’s sharing features, which are limited to two devices and only AirPods or Beats products.”
The Plex looks to be a solidly built mid-tier 6.53-inch handset, set for launch in parts of Europe and Australia. Meantime, I wouldn’t be too surprised to see Tempow’s tech hit an even wider adoption among Android handset makers in the coming year.
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KaiOS raises $50M, hits 100M handsets powered by its feature phone OS
While Android and iOS have locked up the market for smartphone operating systems, a feature phone platform that has the distinction of being the world’s third biggest mobile OS is announcing a hefty round of funding to continue its expansion. KaiOS, which makes the OS that powers devices like Nokia’s feature phones and Jio’s devices out of India, has raised $50 million from Cathay Innovation (which led the round) and previous investors Google and TCL Holdings.
The funding takes the total raised by KaiOS — which has now shipped 100 million devices across 100 countries — to $72 million. It comes less than a year after Google invested $22 million in the business — a strategic round that also marked KaiOS beginning the process of creating native integrations of different Google services like Maps and (more recently) Assistant into the platform.
KaiOS is not disclosing its valuation, but Sebastien Codeville, its CEO, confirmed it is “definitely up.” (PitchBook put it at a very modest $43.75 million last year on the back of Google’s earlier round.)
We actually knew a little about this round back in February, at MWC in Barcelona, when KaiOS announced new handset partners and a raft of new features. A spokesperson for KaiOS told TechCrunch the delay in closing the deal and making it public was due to a need to coordinate with different stakeholders.
As it turned out, KaiOS’s timing for this announcement turned out to be pretty interesting. The big news this week in mobile is what kind of an impact Huawei will face in the wake of a U.S. regulation barring it from doing business in the U.S. One development in that story has been just how serious Huawei is about building its own operating system to replace Google’s Android and its related services.
This is big news because while Huawei is currently the world’s second-biggest mobile phone maker, we haven’t seen any platform gain reasonable mobile phone traction against the hegemony of iOS and Android outside of China — including the failure of Firefox OS, which retreated from the market only to reemerge, phoenix-like, as KaiOS two years ago — in part because of the extensive ecosystems that have coalesced around these two.
But while all eyes are on smartphones, KaiOS’s funding and general growth represents an interesting alternative for markets, carriers and consumers that might be in the market for what KaiOS refers to as “smart feature phones.”
Today, the company counts companies like Reliance Jio, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Orange, MTN and Qualcomm among its partners, and it’s been building an interesting, two-pronged strategy for targeting people both in developed and developing markets.
As Codeville describes it, in emerging markets (which are KaiOS’s primary target), its devices are being purchased by first-time phone users, or those that have had very basic, non-data mobile phones and are upgrading without the big step and expense of smartphones. “We are bringing people to internet usage with a device they are familiar with,” he said of the form factor. “Other key characteristics are a long battery life, a keyboard and a more resistant touch panel.”
The developed market, he added, was an interesting opportunity because of the amount of professionals and others who want pared-down devices for weekend use to unplug from their daily grind.
Many had left feature phones for dead with the growth in popularity of devices like the iPhone, app stores and, of course, apps themselves. But research from Counterpoint found that feature phones still accounted for almost 25% of all handset shipments in Q3 of last year, working out to a $28 billion market opportunity in the years ahead. Today there are some 1.5 billion feature phone users, an interesting number to consider as smartphone sales continue to feel the crunch.
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We’re ready for foldable phones, but are they ready for us?
This is the moment we’ve been waiting for. After years of prototypes, the age of foldables has finally arrived. They’re here. I’ve seen them, and even, briefly, touched one.
And that’s about as far as it goes, to be honest. A week after Samsung kicked off its S10 event with an in-depth look at the Galaxy Fold, the device made its IRL debut at MWC, this week. We got to the show an hour early on the first day, only to find four devices trapped behind glass cases.
They weren’t doing much of anything at all. Two were splayed to show the backs of the devices and two showed off the screens. We were able to get within a few inches of the things before security swooped in and put up the ropes. The Fold has a release date that’s just under two months away, and yet here we are, stuck admiring the thing from afar.
Huawei was a bit better. Another morning session yesterday found us backstage at the company’s booth, getting up close and personal with the Mate X. But things got a little weird. I’m used to being babysat with pricey new devices, but Huawei went out of its way to severely limit interactivity with the product, as noted in the story.
TCL’s product got a similar behind-glass treatment as the Fold. Though there’s one key difference: the company gave a 2020 time frame for its more affordable (more affordable than $2,600, that is) take on the category. That, hopefully, is enough time to work out all of the kinks ahead of product launch.
That neither Huawei nor Samsung feel confident enough to let us go a bit more in-depth with their soon-to-be-released devices isn’t the kind of thing that really instills one with confidence in an emerging space. Royole, to its credit, let the press go fully hands-on with its products back at CES, though, by nearly all accounts, the product feels more like a developer device than anything.
And that, really, is the fear. Samsung’s charging an arm and a leg for the device, at $1,980. Huawei’s tossed in another limb, bringing the total up to $2,600. That’s not beta-tester levels. That’s double the cost of already exorbitant flagship smartphone pricing for products that appear to still have a lot of bugs to work out.
It’s true that there’s a lot that needs to be redesigned after generations of coalescing around the same basic form factor, both from a hardware and software perspective. But it’s one thing to announce a concept and another entirely to bring it to market. If these initial devices ultimately prove buggy or are otherwise a letdown from a user perspective, it’s going to be a fairly inauspicious start for a long-promised form factor.
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