BEIJING (Reuters) – Huawei’s new foldable smartphone has stoked nationalistic pride in China, with social media speculation abuzz with what proponents see as the company’s ability to outdo Apple in innovation despite U.S. sanctions. Yet many are railing against the phone’s $2,800 price tag.
The Chinese tech giant on Tuesday unveiled its Mate XT, the industry’s first tri-fold phone, just hours after Apple introduced its artificial intelligence-enhanced iPhone 16 series.
Both the Mate XT and iPhone 16 go on sale from September 20, but the Mate XT is expected to only be available in China.
“Apple didn’t fall, but Huawei really rose again,” said one user on Weibo, the Chinese equivalent of X.
Another wrote: “Times are changing. US sanctions have been in vain.”
A video showing Apple Store employees in China going to a Huawei Store to watch Huawei’s product launch was also the second trending item on Weibo for 13 hours, with 91 million views and more than 6,600 comments.
The launch of the Mate XT follows Huawei’s resurgence in the premium 5G smartphone market last year with the Mate 60 series and this year with the high-end Pura series of phones featuring domestically produced semiconductors.
In China, the events are being celebrated as a victory over US sanctions that have denied the company access to advanced American chips and other technology since 2019.
Washington views Huawei as a national security risk — a charge the company denies. U.S. sanctions have since expanded to include export bans on highly advanced U.S. chips to all Chinese companies, with Washington seeking to hamper technological advances for the Chinese military.
Huawei fans also noted that Apple has yet to announce an AI partner in China to power the iPhone 16 product line and that Apple Intelligence, the company’s AI software, will only be available in Chinese next year.
Despite nationalistic pride, the Mate XT’s starting price of 19,999 yuan was widely criticized as too high for the average consumer and too insensitive at a time of slow economic growth when ordinary citizens are struggling with financial uncertainty.
Versions with more advanced features, such as larger memory, cost as much as 23,999 yuan ($3,300).
A Weibo poll for the Mate XT showed that only 966 of the 9,200 respondents said they plan to buy it. Over 4,700 said they were put off by the price, while another 3,500 said they weren’t considering buying it at this time.
“As much as I like the product, the price tag sounds ridiculous,” said a person surnamed Xu at a Huawei store in Beijing, who described himself as a loyal Huawei supporter.
“Maybe Huawei doesn’t target people like me at all,” he added.
($1 = 7.1138 Chinese Yuan Renminbi)
(Reporting by the Beijing newsroom; Editing by Anne Marie Roantree and Edwina Gibbs)