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are foldable screen phones "useless innovation" or "the trend"? similar discussions have always been a hot topic in the industry. to answer this question, let's go back to the "starting point" of the emergence of foldable screen phones, which was 2019. at that time, one of the bottlenecks encountered by smartphones was that after the "full screen" design, the display size boundary of portable products was difficult to break through.

while many manufacturers are still obsessed with increasing the screen-to-body ratio from 90% through "full-screen design", the emergence of foldable screen phones has provided a new idea. this is also the reason why the horizontal foldable screen with "portable large size" as the core selling point can be recognized in the market first.

according to the latest data from cinno research, sales of foldable phones in the chinese market reached 2.62 million units in the second quarter of 2024, a year-on-year increase of 125% and a month-on-month increase of 11%, maintaining a triple-digit year-on-year growth rate for four consecutive quarters.

on september 2, huawei officially announced that it will hold a new product launch conference at 14:30 on the 10th of this month. this morning, huawei terminal released a warm-up video, informing that the new product will be named huawei mate xt extraordinary master. subsequently, yu chengdong, huawei's executive director, chairman of the terminal bg, and chairman of the intelligent automotive solutions bu, forwarded the weibo. it is worth noting that the weibo tail used to display the phone model has been updated to "huawei mate xt".

combined with the z-shaped elements in the pre-heating poster, it can be speculated that huawei mate xt extraordinary master may be the "huawei three-fold screen mobile phone" that was previously rumored.

what will the huawei tri-fold with “fold upon fold” change?

the earliest information about huawei's upcoming three-fold screen mobile phone can be traced back to march this year, when the state intellectual property office china patent announced huawei's "folding screen device" patent, with an application date of february 21, 2023. the content shows that the patent adopts a three-fold design, and multiple shells can be of different thicknesses, which reduces the thickness of the device in the folded state and makes it lighter, thereby providing users with a better grip feel.

based on the patent information alone, it is not difficult to infer that the huawei triple-folding screen mobile phone launched this time is still to solve the contradiction between "portability" and "super large screen", which has always been the core selling point of the folding screen. in february 2019, huawei launched its first folding screen product, huawei mate x, at mwc. with its folding structure, it has achieved a smartphone with a display screen close to 8 inches with a body weight of 300g and a thickness of 11mm.

the latest generation of huawei mate x5 has a 7.85-inch inner screen and a 6.4-inch outer screen, but its weight has been reduced to 243g, which is basically the same as the current flagship smartphones in the candy-bar form factor. it can be said that the current folding screen mobile phone products can already provide a more shocking visual experience without sacrificing weight and portability.

then you may also have a question: is a large screen really important? the answer is yes. from the perspective of visual science, a large screen can display more pixels, which means that images and videos can be presented more clearly and in detail. especially when watching high-definition content or processing complex graphics, a large screen makes it easier for users to notice more details, which is why many people will find details in the pictures that they didn't notice on their tvs or tablets at home when watching movies in the cinema.

at the same time, large screens can better utilize the human eye's field of vision and reduce eye fatigue when focusing and scanning on a small screen. therefore, many iterations of technology hardware are centered around "increasing display size", including the aforementioned tablets, tvs, laptops, monitors, etc.

if huawei really launches a three-fold product, it may be able to further extend the display area of ​​​​about 8 inches that previous folding screen mobile phones have been able to achieve. combined with the horizontally unfolded form, it is also expected to solve the problem that the inner screen of the previous folding screen is too square and the display ratio is difficult to match with other devices.

how far is the foldable screen from the public?

in fact, after five years of development, the price threshold of foldable screen products has been greatly reduced. take huawei's products as an example. the price of the first generation foldable screen product huawei mate x reached 16,999 yuan, not counting the price increase in the second-hand market due to production capacity ramp-up and insufficient supply in the early stage. the latest huawei mate x5, although upgraded in configuration and more compact in structure, and the number of screens increased from 1 to 2 inside and outside, has dropped in price to 12,999 yuan.

at the same time, with the entry of more brands and the launch of more people-friendly "small folding" forms, the relevant industrial chain has also matured. according to the institutional research minutes released by boe, in terms of flexible amoled, the company has achieved exclusive supply to multiple flexible amoled high-end folding product customers. in the first half of 2024, the company's flexible amoled product shipments exceeded 65 million pieces, a year-on-year increase of more than 25%.

tcl huaxing, which is also in the upstream supply chain of screens, also pointed out that benefiting from the company's oled business technology capabilities and downstream demand growth, the t4 production line has maintained high load operation this year. data shows that in the first half of the year, tcl huaxing's shipments of flexible oled mobile phone panels reached 39 million pieces, a year-on-year increase of 180%, and its market share rose to the third place in the world, and its foldable screen shipments ranked fourth in the world.

as the industrial chain becomes increasingly mature and more brands enter the market, the "hard costs" of foldable screen product manufacturing and the "soft costs" of design and technology are declining simultaneously. this is reflected at the level that consumers can perceive, that is, "foldable screens are getting cheaper and cheaper", from a "technological trend" that only a few people could own in the past to an "option" for ordinary people to change their phones.

however, as the industry's first "huawei three-fold screen" mobile phone, and huawei has classified it into the "extraordinary master" product series, it is foreseeable that the price of huawei mate xt extraordinary master will not be cheap, and just like when the first generation of folding screens came out 5 years ago, the first generation of products will inevitably go through a process of capacity climbing.

in 2007, apple released the first generation of iphone, marking the beginning of the modern smartphone era. it is undeniable that the iphone introduced a multi-touch screen and an intuitive user interface, which completely changed the smartphone market and led to the subsequent rise of the smartphone industry.

but many years later, looking back at the latest iphone products, their design, core functions and product form are still stuck in the past few years. instead, huawei, samsung and many domestic manufacturers have started to innovate around segmented application scenarios such as folding screens, gaming phones, and ai phones.

interestingly, huawei has scheduled its press conference on september 10, the same day as apple's press conference, which can be seen as a "battle on the same stage" between huawei and apple. will the sales king of smartphones achieve a second takeoff by relying on ai, or will the pioneer of huawei's three-fold screen mobile phone be able to surpass it by relying on the change of form factor? titanium media app will also start live broadcast on the same day, and everyone will pay attention to it.(this article was first published on titanium media app. author: deng jianyun. editor: zhong yi)