Cell World Congress (MWC) 2025 is only a few brief weeks from now, and corporations have already begun to tease what’s in retailer for the massive annual present. Honor simply launched a pair of latest telephones so it appears like the corporate might be specializing in the software program entrance for MWC this 12 months, pushing ahead with a brand new AI-focused idea it calls the Honor Alpha Plan.
Final 12 months’s launch of the Honor Magic 6 Professional got here with a full dedication to main with AI-forward options, significantly the place the telephone’s digicam was involved. On the time, the idea was nonetheless pretty new amongst telephones, as Samsung had simply introduced Galaxy AI and most different AI-powered options baked into Android used AI earlier than the time period was in vogue.
The most important difficulty with Honor’s AI launch final 12 months was compatibility with non-Honor gadgets and companies. The rollout of Magic OS 9 alongside the Honor Magic 7 Professional helped push that ahead, with options like Magic Portal receiving help for lots of of apps and a cool knuckle gesture that works rather a lot like Circle to go looking. This builds on Google’s operate by making it straightforward to share stuff you circle, not simply seek for them.
At MWC, we anticipate massive issues from the brand-new CEO of Honor, Jian Li, who simply changed earlier CEO George Zhao in mid-January. Little doubt, Li is seeking to make his mark on the corporate as he units the tone for the remainder of the 12 months, and the Honor Alpha Plan sounds precisely like what we’d anticipate.
As you may think from the identify, the phrase “Alpha” is the start of the Greek alphabet and certain a brand new path ahead for the corporate’s AI pursuits. Corporations are spending extra on AI in 2025 than ever, and the crown for the very best AI within the land appears to vary each week. It is not going that Honor goes to leap into the fray with the likes of Open AI, Grok, Gemini, and Deepseek, nevertheless it actually would make sense for the corporate to begin launching extra AI-forward gadgets sooner or later.
The query is whether or not which means including extra AI-enhanced options to its telephones — just like the brand-new AI telephoto function on the Magic 7 Professional — or if it means devoted AI gadgets. One pioneer on this sector, the Humane AI Pin, simply known as it quits. Whereas the idea of a screenless gadget powered by an AI assistant is extraordinarily futuristic, Humane’s implementation of the idea left rather a lot to be desired.
However I may simply see an organization like Honor transferring in to benefit from the curiosity on this market by utilizing its experience on AI and gadget ecosystems. Honor already produces laptops, smartphones, tablets, smartwatches, and extra that each one hyperlink collectively in impressively cohesive methods.
I exploit an Honor MagicBook Artwork 14 Snapdragon Version as my predominant laptop computer, and it pairs completely (and seamlessly) with the Honor Magic 7 RSR and two Honor tablets that I’ve. Utilizing a pill as a second laptop computer display screen is as straightforward as hitting the “join” button that pops up when the pill is unlocked, and the identical goes for larger display screen foldable telephones just like the Honor Magic V3.
Many of the firm’s enchancment occurred all through 2024, and 2025 appears to be the very best 12 months but. Android Central Telephones editor Harish Jonnalagadda wrote about Honor’s spectacular upward trajectory, and I’ve little question the brand new CEO is aiming even increased with the Honor Alpha Plan when it is unveiled at MWC.
Jian Li comes from a Huawei background, at a time when the corporate led smartphone digicam innovation earlier than U.S. commerce sanctions stymied the enterprise for a number of years. Now, Li has moved on to the helm of Honor and is clearly able to take the corporate to the subsequent degree internationally.
Whereas I may hope for a correct U.S. launch of the corporate’s merchandise, I dare not maintain my breath within the present political local weather. As an alternative, I believe the corporate will focus much more on distinctive AI options which are being copied by rivals and devoted AI-forward gadgets that may work nicely with all kinds of gadgets, not simply Honor’s.
In spite of everything, the Alpha Plan’s at the moment laid-out imaginative and prescient states that Honor “is dedicated to fostering an open and collaborative atmosphere the place innovation thrives via partnership.” Provided that the most recent Honor gadgets work higher than ever with Google’s personal Gemini companies, it is smart to me that Honor would push itself to be the main worldwide Android model, particularly since Samsung has been so stagnant prior to now few years.
