Huawei’s trick to release new smartphones with Google apps

Why is one smartphone not the other? For example, how do we distinguish a Huawei P30 from a Xiaomi Mi 9? They seem simple questions, but they are not. While the names of smartphones seem simple enough, behind them lies a jumble of names and model numbers that are as difficult to untangle as the cables in a box that has been sitting in the attic for years. Take Xiaomi, which recently announced the Mi CC9 Pro and the Mi Note 10, which are basically the same phone under two different names. The other way around is also possible: Apple released two versions of the iPhone 4 in 2010, with a clear difference in the metal side; the antenna lines were in a different place.

What rarely happens is that a manufacturer gives a phone the hardware of an older model with the name of a newer phone. Yet that is exactly what Huawei seems to be doing now. The company has good reasons for this, but it’s easy to get confused. So it’s time to explain what Huawei does and why.

The trade ban

In mid-May, the US government banned companies in the US from trading with Huawei . As a result, Google is no longer allowed to approve new smartphones from Huawei. They should therefore be released without Google apps and that has happened, with the Mate 30 Pro for example. That phone runs Android 10 without Google services.

But Huawei is not sitting still, because Huawei subsidiary brand Honor released the Honor 9X in Europe two weeks ago. That is a mid-range smartphone with Android 9 and with Google apps. Huawei announced the Honor 9X in China in July, a few months after the trade ban went into effect. How can that phone run Google apps?

The trick appears to be in the type number. The Honor 9X has the type number STK-LX1. Huawei model numbers work like this: the first three letters stand for the code name of the phone and LX is the designation of a device for the European market. For example, the P30 Pro is called the VOG-LX9, where VOG stands for Vogue, the code name during the development of the phone.

However, the Honor 9X is called HLK-AL10 in China, so a completely different name. There is another phone that is also called STK-LX1: the P Smart Z from Huawei, which came out in May. Do you catch him? The Honor 9X looks like a brand new phone, but because the model number indicates it’s a P Smart Z, Google sees it as a phone approved before the trade ban and so it’s allowed to come out with Google apps; no new approval is required for an old phone.

But when is a phone a variant of an older model that already had approval, and when is it a new model? There’s no public info on that, except Google’s Compatibility Definition Document , but that’s inconclusive. However, we can deduce the necessary by listing the specs of the Honor 9X for Europe, the 9X for China and the P Smart Z.

This overview somewhat shows in which respects telephones must be the same and in which respects they may differ. What we know for sure is that the soc should not differ. Although Huawei has the 7nm-soc Kirin 810, for the 9X in Europe it is only allowed to use the older 710F, which the company has made at 12nm.

Another striking point is that the fingerprint scanner seems to be in the same place. It is probably a physically different scanner on the side, because it cannot be around there. That probably requires other drivers in the firmware and that adjustment is not allowed. Note that these are scanners based on the same technology: capacitive scanners. It’s not like Huawei wanted to release the 9X with a scanner behind the screen.

What doesn’t seem to matter is the camera. Compared to the P Smart Z, the 9X in Europe has a completely different camera system. The primary camera is different and there is also a camera with an ultra-wide angle lens. The 9X also has more storage than the P Smart Z, but it makes sense that it is allowed to release a variant with more or less memory or storage. That often happens.

We do not know whether Huawei is allowed to make changes to the battery capacity. We don’t actually know that about the screen either, but there is a strong indication that it is not allowed and that is due to the second smartphone that Huawei seems to want to convert: the Honor 20S.

WinFuture reported this week that the Honor 20S is coming soon based on the same trick. The name is the same as that of the Honor 20S that Huawei presented in China, but the hardware is the same as that of this spring’s P30 Lite. Where the 20S in China has a 6.26″ LCD with a hole in the top left corner, the P30 Lite has a 6.15″ LCD with a notch in the middle. The pictures of the 20S for Europe clearly show a screen with a notch and this device therefore seems to follow the characteristics of the P30 Lite.

It’s obvious why Huawei is doing all this. The release of smartphones with Android and without Google services is not feasible in Europe. Consumers expect all apps to work and to have access to things like the Play Store on Android. So if Huawei still wants to generate revenue from the European market and wants to do so by releasing new smartphones, this is a way to still make money.

It may go well for a while. Many buyers do not look at the soc of a phone, but are sensitive to additions such as extra cameras. And those are precisely things that Huawei can change on old models without having to have the phone inspected again. Moreover, it can eventually switch to a new soc to ensure that mid-range phones remain attractive: the Kirin 980 from the P30 Pro and Mate 20 Pro would not look out of place in a cheap smartphone in a few years.