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The Next Nexus: Two Next-Gen Devices Built By Huawei & LG?
Google’s gearing up for two more Nexus devices this year, LG will reportedly return along with newcomer Huawei
Well this is a turn out for the books. According to rumours on the web Google is already preparing its next Nexus devices and this time it’s not pairing up with Motorola, HTC, or Samsung. No, it’s being Nexus pals with none other than Huawei, while LG is returning for a third time.
There have already been a few reports floating around that Google was considering a team-up with a Chinese phone maker, with Huawei being amongst those proposed by the rumour mill, however, another rumour in circulation around the same time said Google was back in business with LG. Now though, according to an article penned by GizmoChina, Kenin Yang, director of Chinese research and analytics firm iSuppli, took to Chinese social network Weibo to reveal that Huawei is the manufacturer to watch. The report also adds that LG is still believed to be partnering with Google on one Nexus device, suggesting there may again be two launched in the year, likely a tablet and a smartphone, from different partner OEMs.
There’s little else to go on at this point, and it could still be a load of cobblers, but we’re going to remain open-minded about it for now. It does raise some interesting points, however, most notably that Huawei has previously proven a controversial Chinese manufacturer when it comes to the US market; at one point it was more or less blacklisted by the US government on suspicion of spying…needless to say it’s hard to imagine a Huawei-made Nexus device being welcomed with an open door, and it does beg the question of how Google might hope to bring such a device to retail in its home nation unmolested. Huawei has certainly been making considerable efforts to gain greater recognition and traction in the mobile space, particularly in Western markets; it’s fair to say that partnering with Google on Nexus hardware worked wonders for LG’s prestige, so it could do the same for Huawei too.
The questions also remain over which manufacturer would make which type of device and how they would be named. In recent years Google has named its Nexus devices based on display size with the Nexus 4, Nexus 5, Nexus 6, Nexus 7, Nexus 9 and Nexus 10, when rebooting the Nexus 7 it simply added the year on the end (Nexus 7 2013). LG has previously handled Google’s smartphone devices twice with the Nexus 4 and Nexus 5, while Asus took care of the Nexus 7, Samsung the Nexus 10 (and previously the Samsung Galaxy Nexus smartphone), HTC the Nexus 9, and Motorola the Nexus 6.
It really is anybody’s guess, but for us wishful thinking says Google will have listened to the feedback on the Nexus 6 being too large and instead opt for a Nexus 5 successor (Nexus 5 2015?). There’s an argument for LG making it again, as it did so well before, but to be honest we’ve also been tremendously impressed with Huawei’s high-end exterior design, aesthetics and build quality for the likes of the Ascend P7 and Honor 6, which could do very nicely on a Nexus phone.
Thoughts, dear readers? Let us know in the comments below!
Paul Briden
14:41, 6 Mar 2015