Samsung revealed its latest smartphone, the Galaxy A9, featuring the world’s first rear camera with four lenses.
The company Thursday said its latest phone will come with 128 gigabytes of storage and up to 512 gigabytes of expandable memory.
The phone also features its Bixby virtual assistant, payment service Samsung Pay and fitness tracker Samsung Health. It will come in three different colors — Caviar Black, Lemonade Blue and Bubblegum Pink.
“As a global leader in smartphone innovation, we understand the demand for meaningful innovation in a fast-paced world driven by visual communication,” said DJ Koh, president and chief executive of the IT and mobile communications division at Samsung Electronics.
“Building on our legacy in smartphone camera development we’re introducing next-generation technology across our entire Galaxy portfolio to give more consumers the opportunity to experience cutting-edge innovation.”
Earlier this year, Koh told CNBC the company was planning on including cutting-edge techin its mid-range Galaxy A line of smartphones, even before it does in its high-end ones. Koh also said the firm was set to reveal its rumored foldable smartphone this year.
Many watchers of the company were also anticipating the unveiling of its quad camera. Leaks emerged showing a picture of the phone’s rear on Wednesday.
The phone includes a main rear camera with 24 megapixel resolution and autofocus, a telephoto lens with 2x optical zoom for detailed close-ups and long shots, an ultra-wide lens with scene optimization and artificial intelligence-powered scene recognition, and a depth lens aimed at letting users manage a photo’s depth of field and focus. The selling point of a camera with four lenses is that a photographer is able to alternate between different lenses that enable specific features, such as photos taken from a long distance or panoramic shots.
Samsung’s Galaxy A9 is a step up from its A7 model, which was the company’s first phone to include a triple-lens camera on the back. A number of competitors, including Huawei and LG, have also released triple-lens cameras on their phones.
The announcement follows the release of Samsung’s high-end Galaxy Note 9 in August, its most expensive phone to date, retailing at $999.99 for a standard version and $1,249.99 for one with more storage.
Last week, the firm released its earnings guidance, predicting it would be on track to score record profits in the third quarter. It has struggled due to a slowing global smartphone market, and said in its second-quarter earnings statement that operating profit for the mobile business dropped 34 percent from the previous year.
The likes of Samsung and U.S. rival Apple — which unveiled its new high-end iPhone models last month — have also faced increasing competition from rising Chinese competitors, such as Huawei, Xiaomi and ZTE.
— CNBC’s
Arjun Kharpal
contributed to this report.
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