Huawei and LG Present Their New Flagship Smartphones

Huawei and LG are angling to steal the show at this year’s Mobile World Congress, according to Bloomberg. They're ushering in new smartphones that each hopes will fill a void created by the absence of a new handset from the usually dominant Samsung.

A day before the industry’s biggest conference gets going in Barcelona, LG hosted an event to show off its new G6 smartphone with and edge-to-edge display, no plastic or metal bezel around it. Huawei updated its flagship line, introducing the P10 phone with Leica camera technology and curved edges at its own event.

With Apple skipping the gathering as it has in previous years and Samsung introducing new tablets instead of phones, Europe’s technology mecca is a prime stage for smaller handset makers striving to become household names. Both Huawei and LG over the past years have gone from low-cost, basic phones to products that rival the features of Samsung’s Galaxy or Apple’s iPhone at cheaper prices.

LG and Huawei will also face competition from two brands with European and U.S. roots. HMD Global, which has licensed the Nokia brand for its devices, unveiled the Nokia 3 and Nokia 5 smartphones that will each sell for under 190 euros, along with a new version of its Nokia 3310 feature phone.  Lenovo, which acquired the Motorola handset business three years ago, showed the Moto G5 and Moto G5 Plus premium devices. Meanwhile, Samsung showed two new tablets and said its newest flagship will start selling on March 29.