Huawei Pura70 raids on sale, can it win back the first place from Apple？

Text | Pacific Technology

After Huawei’s Mate 60 series "pre-sale" at the end of August last year, Huawei has repeated this scene again.

On April 18, Huawei’s Pura70 series of mobile phones suddenly went on sale! Huawei’s Pura70 series comes in four versions: Pura70, Pura70 Pro, Pura70 Pro +, and Pura70 Ultra, priced at 5,499 yuan to 10,999 yuan.

The sudden launch of the Mate 60 series last year not only triggered a heated debate among the people, but its sales popularity remained high for a long time, and the Mate 60 was still out of stock until the end of last year. Perhaps because of the huge attention brought by the "sudden attack", Huawei’s Pura 70 series of mobile phones also followed this strategy that violated industry practices.

Huawei has high hopes for this new phone. A few days before the launch, Huawei announced the upgrade of the P series brand to the Pura series, and the Pura70 is the first phone in the series. If the Mate 60 is a sign of Huawei’s return to the 5G smartphone market, then the Pura70 is a weapon for Huawei to attack the city.

Previously, Huawei’s peak in the high-end mobile phone market (priced at ≥ $600) was in the first half of 2020. At that time, Huawei surpassed Apple’s 41% market share with 44%, becoming the first in China’s high-end market. Now, with the hot sale of the Mate 60 series and the launch of the Pura 70 series, Huawei has regained lost ground in the high-end market. Whether it can overtake Apple and regain its former No. 1 will be a key battle.

According to Huawei’s previously announced data, by the end of 2021, Huawei’s P series had shipped more than 100 million units (excluding Huawei’s P60 series), which is an outstanding achievement as a high-end smartphone. Yu Chengdong, executive director of Huawei, CEO of Consumer BG, and chairperson of Smart Car Solutions BU, said that after the Huawei P series is upgraded to "Huawei Pura", the series of mobile phones will continue to adhere to imaging and aesthetic exploration.

For those brands that are weighed down by negative factors, a name change may be a new option to break free from the pressure of public opinion, but for a brand that is already well-known and almost positive, a name change is definitely a big deal, because it may mean that the previously established brand recognition is reset to zero.

But Huawei has been thinking about changing its name for a long time. According to Tianyancha’s intellectual property information, as early as 2019, Huawei applied for the registration of multiple "Pura" and "HUAWEI Pura" trademarks, which are classified as scientific instruments in the international classification. So far, two trademarks have been successfully registered.

In Spanish, "pura" means "pure", which is similar to "pure" in English. It is worth mentioning that Spanish is also the third most spoken language in the world, after Chinese and English. Therefore, some industry analysts say that this name change is likely to be a signal for Huawei to return to overseas markets. With Huawei’s brand influence in China, it should not be difficult to rebuild the Pura brand, especially when its first product, the Pura70 series, still has good product power.

In addition to the name, the most significant change of Huawei Pura70 is obviously the appearance. Its rear camera module adopts a triangular design, which is particularly different from the many ring and rounded square modules. Pura70 is currently the only mainstream mobile phone with a triangular module design. Although the aesthetic may be difficult to achieve unity, the recognition is full.

In addition to the changes in appearance, the internal Pura70 impact system has also been greatly upgraded, including the top version of Pura70 Ultra equipped with a 1-inch outsole 50 million pixel lens, the other two are 50 million pixel macro telephoto lens, 40 million pixel ultra wide-angle lens.

This is also the first time Huawei has adopted a one-inch outsole. In the past few years, due to appearance constraints, Huawei has lagged behind its peers by one or two generations in terms of lens sensors. Now not only has it finally caught up with competitors, but also means that Huawei has returned to normal in the supply chain.

It is worth mentioning that this main camera also uses a telescopic lens design. Its biggest advantage is that it can use the lens to telescopic to change the focal length like many professional cameras. In other words, the Pura70 Ultra may not need algorithms, and can achieve professional camera-like background blurring with this telescopic lens alone. It has to be said that smartphones are getting closer and closer to the camera.

However, the most popular processor of Huawei’s Pura70 series is the same as the Mate 60 series, and the specific model is not disclosed. Some technology bloggers have revealed that it may be a small upgrade of the Kirin 9000S.

In terms of other configurations, the Huawei Pura70 series is also similar to the Mate 60 series, featuring Kunlun glass, two-way satellite communication, and Consonance communication.

In terms of selling price, the prices of different versions of the four products are as follows:

Huawei Pura70:

12GB + 256GB priced at 5499 yuan

12GB + 512GB priced at 5999 yuan

12GB + 1TB priced at 6999 yuan

Huawei Pura70 Pro:

12GB + 256GB priced at 6499 yuan

12GB + 512GB priced at 6999 yuan

12GB + 1TB priced at 7999 yuan

Huawei Pura70 Pro +:

16GB + 512GB priced at 7999 yuan

16GB + 1TB priced at 8999 yuan

Huawei Pura70 Ultra:

16GB + 512GB priced at 9999 yuan

16GB + 1TB priced at 10999 yuan

Compared with Huawei Mate 60 Pro + and iPhone 15 Pro Max, the configuration and functions of Huawei Pura70 Ultra are remarkable, and the hot sale of Mate 60 series last year also proved Huawei’s appeal in the mobile phone market.

Tianfeng Securities analyst Guo Mingping previously predicted that P70 series (Pura70 series) 2024 shipments are expected to achieve significant growth, year-on-year growth may be as high as 230%, reaching 13 million – 15 million.

If the Pura70 series is selling as well as the Mate 60 series, then the first thing it may face is the production capacity problem. Last year, the Mate 60 series was out of stock for a long time after its launch, and its production capacity was long unable to meet market demand. Now that the Pura70 series arrives, Huawei needs to solve this problem first.

A Huawei store salesperson told PConline that the stock of the Pura 70 series is two to three times that of the Mate 60 series, but it is expected that the supply will still be in short supply.

PConline found that as of press time, all four versions of the Pura 70 series have been sold out.

Before the Pura 70 series arrived, the "Big Brother" Mate 60 had already paved the way for it.

Market research firm Counter Puraoint forecasts that in 2024, the global mid-to-low-end mobile phone market of $150-249 (about 1084-1800 yuan) is expected to grow by 11%, while the high-end smartphone market of $600-799 (about 4337 yuan-5776 yuan) will grow by 17%.

Due to limited chips and independent glory, Huawei has been absent in the low-end market for a long time in the past few years. At present, there are only the Enjoy series and the Nova series, but the sales volume is not high. The Nova 12 with the highest number of comments in Huawei’s official mall is also less than 8,000.

Therefore, the high-end market with higher prices has become Huawei’s main battlefield. At present, Huawei’s high-end product lines are mainly Pura70 series, Mate 60 series, folding screen mobile phone Pocket series, Mate Xs series and Mate X5 series. Among them, the best-selling Mate 60 Pro has more than 150,000 comments in Huawei’s official mall.

According to CounterPuraoint Research, in the fourth quarter of 2023, Huawei’s sales volume in China’s smartphone market increased by 71.1%, and its market share increased from 9.5% in the same period last year to 15.2%. The ranking rose from sixth to third.

According to "Wall Street News", as of March 1, the total sales of Huawei Mate 60 series and Mate X5 have exceeded 10 million units. The BCI report also shows that in the fourth quarter of 2023, Huawei’s sales of smartphones over 10,000 yuan in China accounted for 40%.

Previously, Huawei’s peak in the high-end mobile phone market (priced at ≥ $600) was in the first half of 2020. At that time, Huawei surpassed Apple’s 41% market share with 44%, becoming the first in China’s high-end market. Now, with the Mate 60 series selling well and the Pura 70 series on the market, Huawei is making a big comeback. Whether it can overtake Apple and regain its former No. 1 will be a key battle.

In the folding screen market, Huawei is also making great progress. According to the latest report from research firm DSCC, Huawei’s folding screen mobile phone market is expected to grow by 105% year-on-year in the first quarter of this year, and its market share will surpass Samsung for the first time, ranking first in the folding screen mobile phone market.

For today’s Huawei, the main significance of the high-end market is that, although shipments are not as good as the low-end market, a higher average price can greatly enhance Huawei’s profitability and contribute more profits.

According to Huawei’s financial report, in 2023, Huawei achieved global sales revenue of 704.20 billion yuan, an increase of 9.64% year-on-year, of which the end point business achieved sales revenue of 251.50 billion yuan, an increase of 17.3% year-on-year.

It is worth mentioning that the explosion of the Mate 60 series last year also led to the high sales of Huawei Hongmeng Zhixing’s Wenjie M7, and the IPO time between the two was only half a month apart. Now, Wenjie’s new M7 has sold more than 170,000 units in 9 months, with an average monthly sales volume of nearly 20,000 units. But during the same period, the cumulative sales of the brother model Wenjie M5 were only 13,000 units, less than 1/10 of the former.

With the launch of the Pura 70 series, Huawei also seemed to be interested in replicating the strategy of using mobile phones to drive cars. A few days later, on April 23, the new M5 would be released. If it could make certain adjustments in configuration upgrades and prices like the new M7, it would not be impossible to replicate the success of the former.

Huawei mobile phones are back on track, and the direct impact is that the Hongmeng system has more user support.

The Mate 60 went on sale in August last year, and then in early September, Huawei announced the full launch of Hongmeng’s native applications. At this point, Hongmeng began to truly get rid of the "shell" doubts caused by compatibility with Android and move towards "pure blood" Hongmeng.

At present, Huawei has announced that the "Huawei Developer Conference 2024" will be held in June this year, and the HarmonyOS Galaxy Edition will also start the developer beta plan in June, and the commercial version will be released in the fourth quarter.

Previously, Yu Chengdong had said bluntly, "2024 is a crucial year for the original Hongmeng. We must accelerate the development of various Hongmeng native applications and focus on winning the two most difficult battles of technology base and three-party ecology.

It is reported that as of the end of March this year, more than 4,000 applications have joined Hongmeng Ecosystem, covering various fields such as lifestyle e-commerce, travel, finance, social media, information, productivity tools, audio-visual entertainment, and games.

However, this number is still quite different from Android and iOS. According to the data of the national APP technology testing platform, as of the end of May 2023, the number of active APPs in our country’s domestic market has reached 2.61 million. Huawei Hongmeng mobile phone sales are rising, the number of users continues to expand, and the richness of users’ software ecology is also rising. Some niche software still needs more time to adapt.

"A tree cannot make a forest", and Hongmeng ecology needs more Hongmeng mobile phones to develop and grow. Only with more and more users can Hongmeng ecology form a positive cycle and attract more developers to develop Hongmeng applications. Although the Mate 60 series is a hit and the Pura 70 series is quite competitive, the number of users of high-end mobile phones is not as good as that of the low-end market.

But as mentioned above, Huawei’s low-end brand enjoy series and nova series have performed significantly worse than the other two high-end brands in the market in the past two years. Huawei’s mobile phone shipment target in 2024 is 60 million – 70 million units, which is still nearly 4 times behind the 240 million units at the peak in 2019.

Therefore, while maintaining its high-end market position, Huawei may need to consider launching more competitive mid-range and low-end mobile phones, and continue to expand the installed base and user base of the Hongmeng system.

Overall, if the Mate 60 is the prelude to Huawei’s return to the mobile phone market, then the Pura70 is a sign of the full flowering of the software ecosystem after the normalization of Huawei’s supply chain.