Smartphone brand HTC Corp (宏達電) on Thursday unveiled a new entry-level phone — the Desire 19s — hoping to capitalize on the peak consumer spending season at the end of the year.
The new smartphone is equipped with a 6.2-inch touch screen with in-plane switching technology, and has a resolution of 720 x 1,520 pixels and an aspect ratio of 19:9.
The Desire 19s is priced at NT$5,990 (US$196), suggesting that HTC could be positioning it as an option for the government when it procures phones for civil servants.
The Desire 19s is powered by an octa-core MediaTek Helio P22 processor and runs a 3850mAh battery, comes in a single 3GB plus 32GB storage option and is available in two colors — blue and black — HTC said.
HTC will be hoping the phone boosts its sales after the company on Wednesday said that its third-quarter gross margin rose for the seventh consecutive quarter, but that it still posted a quarterly loss for the 16th time in 17 quarters.
The only time HTC has reported a quarterly profit since the first quarter of 2015 was in the first quarter of last year, when its bottom line benefited from the sale of its original design manufacturer assets to Alphabet Inc’s Google.
HTC’s gross margin rose to 22.9 percent in the third quarter, up 2.6 percentage points quarter-on-quarter, but it posted a net loss of NT$2.36 billion, or a loss per share of NT$2.86, compared with a net loss per share of NT$3.18 in the same period last year.
While the company has been squeezed by fierce competition in the global smartphone market, HTC’s gross margin has continued to improve on the back of its efforts to develop virtual-reality technologies, it said.
The appointment of Yves Maitre as chief executive in September would see the firm continuing to develop new virtual-reality technologies, HTC said.
Maitre previously served as executive vice president of consumer equipment and partnership at Orange SA.
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