HUAWEI and Leica setup research lab for photography, image computing, and VR

Huawei and premium camera component engineers Leica originally teamed up to work on the impressive dual-cameras packed into the HUAWEI P9, although the partnership didn’t quite run as deep as we’d originally been led to believe. The two are still working together though, and the companies have just announced a joint venture into a new research and innovation center called the ‘Max Berek Innovation Lab’.

The new lab is located at Leica’s global headquarters in Wetzlar, Germany. The two companies will be collaborating on development of new optical systems and software technologies to improve imaging quality in smartphones and other photographic applications. Interestingly, the monochrome camera setup from the HUAWEI P9 could appear in a similar form in future handsets that use Qualcomm’s new Clear Sight technology.

“With the founding of the Max Berek Innovation Lab, HUAWEI and Leica Camera AG are expanding the scope of their successful strategic relationship and are laying the foundation for close collaboration in research and development of groundbreaking technologies in the imaging segment,” – Markus Limberger, Chief Operating Officer of Leica Camera AG and Director of the Max Berek Innovation Lab

As well as new photography innovations, the lab will be expanding research into computational imaging, augmented reality, and virtual reality solutions. All three of these segments are becoming increasingly common in the mobile space, so we may see some new proprietary pieces of mobile technology from HUAWEI and Leica in the near future.

There’s no mention about whether or not these two companies will continue their collaboration for the cameras inside HUAWEI’s next flagship smartphone, but it looks like there’s a good chance that this will be a long running partnership. Further improvements to the dual-camera setup in the HUAWEI P9 certainly sounds promising.