Huawei flags product event, details about closely watched smartphones expected

China's Huawei Technologies said on Thursday it will hold a media event to discuss new products on Sept. 25, fanning expectations that details about recently released smartphones will be revealed.

Its Mate 60 series is in the spotlight - both for the use of a China-made advanced chip and because the series likely marks the first major attempt by Huawei's smartphone business to come back from crippling U.S. sanctions.

Huawei did not elaborate on the new products that will be discussed but domestic business daily Yicai reported that information about its latest phones will be disclosed. Huawei started selling its latest high-end smartphones Mate 60 and Mate 60 Pro at the end of last month and last week it started presales for its Mate 60 Pro+ smartphone alongside a new foldable phone Mate X5.

The series' launch was unusual in that Huawei did not carry out any pre-marketing or organise a glitzy event. Even so, the phones have caused a stir, with the first sales coinciding with a trip to China by U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and because the Pro version was found to be using a 5G-capable chip made by a Chinese company.

How Huawei's phones will fare against Apple at a time of heightened U.S.-Sino tensions will be of much interest to investors and China watchers.

The launch of Apple's iPhone 15 series this week has drawn mixed reactions in China - the company's third-largest market - with many online users liking its faster chip and improved gaming capabilities while others preferred Huawei's new smartphone.

Further denting Apple's sheen in China, the government has expanded curbs on the use of iPhones by state employees, with some told not to use them at work.

The state-backed Securities Times this week reported that Huawei had raised its Mate 60 series second-half shipment target by 20% due to better-than-expected sales.

Huawei, once the world's largest smartphone maker, saw that business decimated after the U.S. started restricting tech exports to the company in 2019.

The U.S. and other Western governments have labelled Huawei a security risk, a charge the company denies. Since then, Huawei has only sold limited batches of 5G models using stockpiled chips.