Earlier today in China, Huawei Consumer Business Groupe CEO Richard Yu announced the Balong 5000 as the world’s most powerful 5G modem that can deliver up to 6.5 Gbps of 5G speeds. At the same conference, Richard Yu confirmed that Huawei will be launching its 5G phone at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2019 tech expo in Barcelona, Spain in the coming month. He confirmed that the 5G device launching next month will be a foldable device with Kirin 980 chipset and Balong 5000.
Qualcomm Snapdragon X50 LTE modem can offer peak download speeds of 5 Gbps. It does not support Standalone (SA) and FDD frequencies that are supported by Balong 5000 5G modem. The Balong 5000 also supports Non-Standalone (NSA) architecture along with 3G, 4G and 5G networks and consumes less power.
The Kirin 980 chipset that powers the current lot of Huawei and Honor flagship phones features the world’s first Cat. 21 LTE modem which makes it possible to achieve download speeds of up to 1.4 Gbps. Theoretically, the modem offers 4.5G connectivity. Since Kirin 980 is a 5G-ready chip, Huawei will be swapping its Cat. 21 LTE modem with the more powerful Balong 5000 5G modem.
Balong 5000 is the first 5G modem to achieve industry’s benchmark 5G peak download rate by achieving 4.6 Gbps in the sub-6GHz low frequency band and China’s main 5G frequency band along with 6.5 Gbps in the millimeter wave which is the highest frequency band and 5G extended band. To put it in simpler words, the Balong 5000 5G modem can deliver 10 times faster experience than 4G LTE.
Rumors surrounding Huawei’s foldable phone reveals that it will be sporting fold-out design and it will be fitted with flexible OLED panels by China’s BOE display maker. When unfolded, it may offer a screen area of around 8 inches and when folded, it will offer a display of 5 inches. A two-month old report had claimed that the company is considering names like Mate F, Mate Flex, Mate Flexi and Mate Fold names for its foldable smartphone.
Huawei’s chairman Hu Houkun (Ken Hu) had addressed at the World Economic Forum recently that the company has deployed 5G networks in 10 countries and it will be soon made available in 20 additional nations. He also confirmed that the company will be launching its 5G smartphone in June. Probably, he could be either referring to release date of the Huawei’s 5G foldable phone or the arrival of some other smartphone with 5G connectivity.
