Huawei challenges Samsung, Apple with big-screen phones

NEW YORK (Reuters): Huawei Technologies Co Ltd. boosted smartphone display size and resolution on Monday with two new devices aimed at challenging much bigger rivals, including Samsung Electronics Co Ltd. and Apple Inc.

The Chinese phone maker, which is pushing to expand its brand beyond its home country, unveiled the Ascend D2 and Ascend Mate devices on the eve of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. It said the Ascend D2 would have a high-definition screen with 443 pixels per inch compared with the most advanced Samsung and Apple phones, with resolutions closer to the 300 pixels per inch range.

The Ascend Mate device has a 6.1 inch display, which will make it the biggest-screen smartphone in the world, according to Huawei. Samsung’s biggest smartphone to date, the Galaxy Note II has a 5.5 inch display. Huawei’s head of consumer electronics, Richard Yu, said the company is hoping its latest smartphones will offer an alternative for people who have to carry around their tablet computer, laptop, smartphone and camera all at once.

“Our idea is whether we can have one thing for all that,” Yu said.

The company plans to start selling the Ascend D2 in China in January and in Japan and other countries later on. The Ascend Mate will sell in China in February and in the rest of the world in the following months.

Huawei also expects the phones to go on sale in Europe and said it is in talks with US operators about selling them there. It did not announce prices for the devices.