HTC are much beloved as a smartphone company, but they’ve been having a tough time of late against rivals like Samsung, Huawei and LG, who are putting out better phones at lower prices. Still, there might be some reasons to hope.
On the back of the successful launch of the HTC 10, the company has announced a new mid-range phone, the One S9, and there are some intriguing rumours suggesting HTC will build two Nexus devices this year.
HTC One S9 announced
The One S9 is HTC’s latest model, and comes in just under the new 10 in price. It combines a curved metal unibody design and stereo front-facing speakers with a modest 5-inch display and mid-range specifications.
It’s powered by a MediaTek octa-core processor running at 2GHz, backed with 2GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage. In terms of imaging, you can expect a 13-megapixel OIS camera on the back and a 4-megapixel UltraPixel camera up front. The One S9 runs Android 6.0, with the latest version of Sense on top.
The phone looks great, but a relatively high price point of €499 might make it a hard sell against cheaper Android phones like the Moto G or OnePlus X. Still, it seems a fitting replacement for the One A9.
HTC Nexus devices incoming
More excitedly for HTC fans, rumours that the company is building Nexus phones continue to proliferate. Long-time leaker Evan Blass of Venture Beat tweeted that the company is working on two devices for Google with codenames of M1 and S1.
HTC is building a pair of Android N devices for Google internally dubbed M1 and S1 #nexus
— Evan Blass (@evleaks) April 27, 2016
Android Police go a step further, suggesting that these short names stand for Marlin and Sailfish. Google always name their Nexus devices after aquatic sealife (e.g. Shamu, Hammerhead, Angler), and if Android Police are correct then two HTC Nexus devices could definitely be on the cards. The publication won’t name their source, but do share a reference to Marlin by a senior Qualcomm engineer.
It’s not yet clear what form these devices will take, but a phone and a tablet or two phones of different sizes would seem a logical choice. Google recently removed the Nexus 9 tablet from the Google Play store, so I’m leaning towards at least one of the devices being a tablet. And due to the reference to Marlin above, I’m guessing that both devices will run Qualcomm processors, likely the new Snapdragon 820.
Wrap-up
It’s an exciting time for HTC fans. After a long period of low sales and poor critical performance, the company seems to have found its footing once again. The HTC 10 is getting good reviews, they’ve released another One and there are two Nexus phones on the horizon. Let’s see what the rest of 2016 holds.