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Chinese smartphone brand Honor has been in South Africa for less than a year, yet it is starting to make an impact in the mid-range market, partly due to Honor’s parent company Huawei already being an established brand in South Africa. City Press spoke to Honor SA CEO Raymond Lui.
Has the US ban (and suspension of the ban) on Huawei’s business operations affected the Honor brand?
The ban, although unfair, is on the mother company and not just restricted to the Huawei mobile division, so it has affected our brand negatively.
Honestly, consumers had some doubts in terms of ‘what will happen after a few months if I buy an Honor phone now?’. Even my neighbour, who is a retired grandpa, kept asking what was happening. These problems were mainly about the confusion that the ban created among our consumers. Not everyone knows that this is more a political thing between the US and China. This is not a technology thing. I can only tell you we noticed a big dip in market sales in June and July, and we took steps to clarify the situation. Slowly, confidence is being recovered.
Huawei’s new operating system, Harmony OS, has been released in other countries through one of Honor’s products, the Honor Vision smart TV. Tell us more about that.
Harmony OS was launched at the beginning of the month. The Honor Vision is the first device to use Harmony OS from our company. Later, you will see more products with Harmony OS. It must be understood that the operating system is not the only thing we are working on – there are also the applications, which take a long time to create. For now, in South Africa and on our cellphones, we are still using the Android and Google system, which is still our major partner. Also note that the Harmony OS was invented mainly for the artificial intelligence innovation and for the internet of things ecosystem, such as cars and home appliances.
When can we expect Harmony OS in South Africa?
I really can’t give a road map yet. We need to work with our local partners first. It’s definitely not going to happen this year. It’s not that I don’t want to disclose it, it’s that even I don’t have the answer to that.
Read: Huawei's p30 Pro redefines Smartphone photography
So, all Honor phones in the foreseeable future will have Android and not Harmony OS?
Yes.
What phones can we expect from Honor in the next few months?
In October or November, we will be releasing the 9X Honor phone, and will have even stronger specifications and much more functionality. You can expect a stronger camera and larger memory.
So far, we have only seen mid-tier smartphones from Honor here, when will we see the premium products – like the Honor 20 Pro?
We didn’t bring a lot of Honor products to South Africa, mainly because of the maturity of the brand and our operation. But I can’t say when, especially with the Harmony OS-linked products, because that will first have to be launched in South Africa. But, also, these products need to make business sense before they are launched locally.
What’s the difference between Huawei and Honor?
We are a separate brand and we do our marketing and sales strategy separately. Yes, there is competition because we are playing in the same market, but it is not hostile. Huawei and Honor share research and development, but we also target a younger market with less buying power than Huawei. We also market ourselves as a fashion brand – that is why we have aesthetic research labs in Milan and Paris.
Overall, we are still a growing brand with less than 1% of the total smartphone market in South Africa, but, worldwide, we are growing rapidly, especially in China and Russia, and with our community brand spirit of ‘Honor yourself, Honor your family, Honor your world’, this is what we want to achieve in the South African market.
With the expansion of the company to include other global markets, it has achieved over 160% year-on-year growth in overseas markets and has a presence in 75 countries/regions and 100 million global users
Liu’s responses were edited for brevity and clarity.
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