Huawei Mate 20 Pro: there is a new king in town

In an age where people want more from their smartphones without knowing what that "more"

is exactly the Mate 20 Pro delivers. The new flagship is the result of Huawei's constant

improvements to its already great phones, like this year's P20 Pro.

The Mate 20 Pro is a powerhouse with built-in intelligent features, fantastic cameras, ridiculously

good battery life (with wireless reverse charging) and an in-screen fingerprint sensor.

The Mate 20 Pro looks different to its predecessor, the Mate 10 Pro. New tweaks include a

symmetrical design; a curved edge-to-edge notched-display; and the removal of the back-

fingerprint sensor to the in-screen one. The USB-C charging port now doubles up as the stereo

speaker, and the (dual) SIM slot is located at the bottom.

The 6.4-inch flagship is slim and sits comfortably in the hand when compared to the physically

larger Samsung Galaxy Note9

The 6.4-inch flagship is slim and sits comfortably in the hand when compared to the physically

larger Samsung Galaxy Note9 of the same screen size. However, the curved-edge display makes

it look like the Galaxy S9+ once you disable the notch. And yes, it was one of the first things I did

on the twilight-coloured review unit.

It is powered by a 7nm Kirin 980 chipset that Huawei says has significant improvements over its

previous-generation: it uses 40% less power and is 20% faster over its previous-generation 970

chip. It now has two neural processing units for dedicated artificial intelligence tasks.

The exact numbers may not mean much to the average user, but in everyday use over the last two

weeks, the phone was always snappy. From launching apps, to facial and fingerprint unlocking,

taking photos, testing AI colour videos and switching between apps, the phone didn't struggle one

bit.

Fingerprint troubles

I initially enrolled my face and fingerprints while sitting on a moving bus in London, and found it

affected my experience. I subsequently deleted them and set them up again for a smoother

experience. Incidentally, the FNB app on the Mate 20 Pro uses fingerprints only for biometric

authentication, and not facial unlocking as it does with the iPhone X, which I would have preferred

as it's less effort.

The Leica triple camera set-up is made up of a 40-megapixel wide angle, 20MP ultra-wide angle

and an 8MP telephoto lens. I was impressed with the camera on the P20 Pro but the Mate 20 Pro

is next level!

The ability to shoot wide-angle photos without walking a distance away makes a huge difference;

I found it useful when taking photos of historic buildings in London.

i. Using the above case-study, perform a situation analysis and assess the growth opportunities

available for Huawei and Huawei Mate 20 Pro amidst many of the similar products.

(10 marks)

ii. Analyse the competitive structure landscape of mobile phone industry in Botswana using the

Porters Five Forces Model. (10 marks)