LG mobile boss says next flagship phone will go back to basics

In a press conference at Mobile World Congress on Tuesday, the head of LG’s mobile business Hwang Jeong-hwan confirmed that the company will release a totally new premium smartphone this year.

As reported by Yonhap News, the company will go back to basics and focus on four key features: audio, battery, camera, and display (a.k.a. the ABCDs).

LG’s mobile strategy has long been losing the company money and it has made some pretty big attempts to change this up in recent months. First of all, LG announced that it was abandoning its strict annual release schedule. Soon after, the release of the G7 was reportedly delayed in order to review the product from scratch.

LG’s only major release at the MWC was the LG V30S ThinQ, a phone that is basically the same as the original V30 but with more storage, RAM, and a new AI camera.

While this change in strategy may have left some a little confused as to what LG is planning for the future, Hwang Jeong-hwan, who has only been in his position since late November, has now clarified some aspects of the company’s strategy going forward.

First of all, he said that LG will stop focusing on mirroring features found on rival devices as this led them to a cost structure that was unsustainable.

He also said that LG will focus on creating devices with a much longer lifespan by adding features available on new devices to existing products. This would fit in with the fact that the LG V30 and G6 are expected to get the newly released AI camera features found on the V30S ThinQ.

Perhaps some of the changes mentioned by Hwang Jeon-hwan will be just what the division needs to turn its fortunes around.