Huawei launches its P8 phone in South Africa

“Ignite your creativity” was the theme at the Huawei P8 launch held in Johannesburg, South Africa and Huawei has brought their A-Game to the party !

Huawei has made its mark on the South African landscape and it is clear that the brand is growing year-on-year showing earned trust. As South Africans we are skeptical about new companies and it takes several years before we hand over our hard-earned-cash. Huawei has proven itself that it continues to bring to the market new and innovative products which are priced right and still offer incredible quality.

“The goal of the Huawei P8 is to become the most user-friendly smart phone for consumers globally. Huawei seamlessly combines the best elements of style and durability in this device, delivering a revolutionary and premium user experience. The device symbolises our continuous commitment to provide customers with access to premium quality products” said Charlene Munillal, GM of Huawei Consumer Business Group SA.

To paraphrase  Yudi Rambaran, Director Product Marketing Huawei South Africa, who said that Huawei didn’t want gimmicky plastic device. Africans demand quality. And quality is what Huawei delivered with its P8 phone.

Lost in the Hype

As usual, Huawei has added value add features into their flagship device and kinda-sorta- didn’t make a big deal about them. So someone has to !

• Huawei Select – This is an exact rival to Samsung’s ADH. As a P8 owner, for no additional cost, you get a 24-month warranty. Should you break your screen, or drop your phone in water, Huawei will replace it damaged components for you. You can have two water damages or two screen damages or one water & one screen damage.  No cost to the P8 owner.  This shows commitment from the Huawei to stand by its product.
• Security – the P8 comes with automatic encryption to help protect data on the device if it is lost or stolen. The device also comes pre-installed with SELinux running on all applications allows for protection against vulnerability and malware.
• Video Director – with the Huawei P8 you can control 3 additional devices when you shoot a video clip so you at a touch of your finger you can get different angles to the action you are trying to capture. All wirelessly with not additional software.
• Dual-SIM – The Huawei P8 has two slots.  One for the SIM card and one for the MicroSD to expand storage. However, if you put in a second SIM instead of the MicroSD, then the phone will work with both SIMS. This means you can dedicate a SIM to Data and one for Voice. This is especially handy when you travel internationally and need to use a local SIM card but still maintain your primary number.
• UPDATE: the P8 model initially will not have the dual-sim functionality but this is something Huawei is looking at with subsequent models.
• Other features – Another great feature that comes part of the Operating System is when the screen is off, simply utter the words “OK Google” to access the full Google offering. The P8 has also increased the volume by up to 58 percent above normal level in noisy environments, as well as the ability to cut out 90 percent of wind noise when using a headset or earphones with a single mic.

Until I get my hands on one of these devices, here is some basic info:

Price: R7999

Availability in South Africa: second week of July.

Body: one-piece aluminum body, Bevelled body measuring 6,4mm in height and weighing only 144g.

Colours: Huawei P8 is available in silver, gold, black and gray.

Screen: 5.2’’ full HD display with a 1080p resolution

Processor: Kirin 930 Octa-Core 64-bit chipset

Battery: The 2680mAh battery has been optimized through extensive research and development in the Huawei laboratories and offers 24 hours of standby power when only 10 percent battery power remains.

Storage: 16GB or 64GB onboard memory, micro SD card up to 128GB.

Software: Huawei’s Emotion UI 3.0 (EMUI)  running on top of the Android 5.0 Lollipop operating system.