A shopper at the Pavillion mall in Kuala Lumpur looks at the Huawei Mate XT tri-folding phone on Feb. 19, 2025. Arthur Fuentes, ABS-CBN News

KUALA LUMPUR – Hundreds of tech journalists from around the world gathered in Malaysia’s capital this week to attend the Huawei Innovative Product launch on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The Chinese tech giant began the event with the global unveiling of the world’s first ‘trifold’ phone, the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate Design, which unfolds from a standard-sized 6.4-inch handset into a full-sized 10.2-inch tablet.

Huawei also launched other products such as the MatePad Pro 13.2-inch, which the company said provided PC-level productivity in a tablet package, the FreeArc which is an open-ear earbuds with ear hooks, and the Huawei Band 10–its latest fitness band designed to give real-time health data.

The company set up a display inside the Pavillion Mall, one of Kuala Lumpur’s most famous shopping centers, where Huawei showcased the hardware innovations featured in its latest products.

Company officials said the Mate XT was made possible by engineering a new kind of hinge that could withstand the stresses of both the inward and outward folding of its large screen. The screen itself is supposedly 25 percent more bend-resistant than the company’s previous models and can resist compression when folded inward and tension when folded outward.

Tech journalists look at the gadgets on display during the Huawei Innovative Product event in Kuala Lumpur on Feb. 18, 2025. Arthur Fuentes, ABS-CBN News

The Mate XT’s screen also adopts non-Newtonian fluid materials which is more impact-resistant, according to Huawei. The steel used in the Mate XT was also subjected to numerous foldings (up to 80 folds) during the forging process to ensure strength.

For the new MatePad Pro, Huawei said its engineers also devised a new type of screen called the PaperMatte to reduce glare and reflections.

Huawei appears to be positioning its Mate XT as a super-premium device, with a price tag of 3,499 euros. Despite its high price, there are reports that Huawei expects to ship a million units of the Mate XT, with demand reportedly high in China.

Huawei has yet to announce when the device will become available in the Philippines, or how much it will cost, but at P60.51 per euro, the price would come to around P211,724.