Qualcomm holds its Snapdragon Tech Summit 2018 in Maui, Hawaii with its biggest announcement regarding its new chipset, the Snapdragon 855 to power 5G handsets in 2019. OnePlus CEO Pete Lau was the first to confirm on stage that the company will launch a smartphone that features the powerful chipset, but it's going to be more expensive than its forerunners.
Talking to Tech Radar, Pete Lau said that OnePlus 7, the company's next 5G smartphone that will feature the Snapdragon 855 chipset will be around $200 - $300 higher than the previous models. He added that the price won't be a problem for those that are yearning for a 5G handset, especially if it's what they're after.
What's more interesting is that Lau also confirmed that they won't just release a 5G handset, but also a 4G smartphone to cater those users that don't want to take advantage of the 5G network speed, which will be widespread in late 2019 or early 2020. "Because 5G will be very much for a small unique portion of enthusiasts, we'll have a 4G product also developed and available in parallel," he said. "Because of what that has been able to offer, many people will see the existing OnePlus flagship offering in comparison to other flagships being a much more reasonable price."
The tech giant is just being smart for developing 4G and 5G handsets to cater to each group of users, and Lau believes that the competition won't be washed down the drain. He also added that OnePlus users who want faster speed were the company's major reason for its efforts to produce a 5G connectivity smartphone.
Lau has confirmed that the company will bring its 5G handset first to Europe in partnership with EE in the UK although he cannot provide a release date or the name of the phone. However, considering the general naming convention of the company to its smartphone, it can be safely named for now as OnePlus 7.
Users also estimated that the next 5G smartphone might be released in April 2019 as OnePlus normally releases a new device every six months. OnePlus 6T was launched in October 2018, and the target date might be possible.
There will be more upgrades, but Lau confirmed that a camera improvement is one thing that he's excited about as the Snapdragon 855 chipset has a powerful AI front. A 4G version of the handset is possible with the new chipset without the need to use the 5G speed.
