MWC: Honor takes new AI direction

Honor’s new corporate strategy is to become an AI devices company and will spend $10 billion in the next five years to achieve this goal.

The announcement was made by CEO James Li in Spain, ahead of the opening of MWC Barcelona, in what it calls the Honor ‘Alpha Plan’. Recharged was in attendance in Spain, as a guest of Honor South Africa.

“It is clear that the AI revolution will reshape the paradigm of the device industry, completely transforming our productivity, our society, and even our culture more than ever before,” said Li.

Honor detailed its three-step plan including the development of an intelligent phone with agentic AI, co-creating an intelligent AI ecosystem with partners, and to co-create an intelligent world.

“I am calling on all of us to unite together to address the challenges, as well as the many opportunities, of AI technology. I also call on the industry to be truly open so that we can fully embrace this exciting AI future,” added Li.

Honor plans to develop a new phone with partners Google and Qualcomm, that will leverage Gemini 2.0 to “further develop AI experiences” and AI agents.

At its keynote presentation, Honor said it developed the first “GUI-based” personal mobile AI agent.

It demonstrated how its AI agent can help make a restaurant reservation with a third party service while also considering existing appointments saved in calendar and traffic information.

It also announced “AiMAGE”, powered by Honor’s AI kernel to support device-cloud AI models that can improve image clarity.

Honor recently showed its new AI Upscale feature to restore old images, which will roll out with the Magic7 series starting in March.

The company also showed its all-ecosystem file sharing technology that lets users transfer files between one or many iOS and Android devices, plus an AI Deepfake detection feature.

Honor to offer 7 year Android updates

Alongside its Alpha Plan, Honor also made a major announcement: it will offer seven years of Android OS and security updates for its flagship Magic Series, starting with EU markets. It currently offers five years of support.

Honor joins Samsung with its seven year commitment to provide updates to user, apart from Google phones, which isn’t officially available in South Africa.

The seven year Android OS and security updates will begin with the flagship Magic7 Pro device. Recharged has been testing the Magic7 Pro unit in Barcelona, ahead of its South African launch.

New products for international markets

At the end of its presentation, Honor touched on products that will head to international markets.

The first is its AI PC, the MagicBook Pro 14 that Honor teased in South Africa at its X9c event, coming soon for R13 999.

It uses Honor’s Turbo X for powerful performance and up to 12 hours of battery life from its 92Wh battery, according to Honor.

It has a 31.K OLED touch screen, weighs 1.37kgs, and features its AI powered MagicRing and cross platform sharing.

The Honor Pad V9 is a 6.1mm thin tablet that weighs 475g. It is powered by a MediaTek Dimensity 8350 Elite chipset, has 8 speakers with spatial audio, abd a 10 100mAh battery with 35W SuperCharge.

The tablet also has AI features as seen on its smartphones, like Circle to Search, AI Eraser, AI Notes, AI Docs, MagicRing and Magic Portal.

There’s also a new Watch 5 Ultra in brown or black with a titanium finish, that supports diving and over 100 sports modes. It is the Apple Watch Ultra and Galaxy Watch Ultra equivalent.

It promises 15 days of battery life, and health features like scans, reports and all day tracking.

Lastly, Honor introduced the Earbuds Open with an ergonomic design that supports AI Live Translation, and a hybrid active noise cancellation (ANC). It will come in black and gold.

It supports gestures and touch controls, has a surround subwoofer, and promises up to 22 hours of battery life from its charging case.

Honor South Africa is yet to confirm availability of the full line up.