The Chinese manufacturer ZTE had a rough couple of
months while it was under fire from the US Department of Commerce due to
breaching a trade embargo. The company was on the brink of bankruptcy until it
finally decided to pay up to stay in the game.
Now ZTE is looking forward to a brighter future -
the company already listed its Blade V9 smartphone, initially announced in
February at MWC, for preorder on JD.com. The device is offered in two variants
with prices between CNY 999 and CNY 1,199 (no more than US$ 175/€ 150).
The affordable device has a 5.7” tall screen with
Full HD+ resolution. It is powered by the 14 nm Snapdragon 450 and has
octa-core CPU, clocked at 1.8 GHz. The dual camera on the back has a 16 MP
primary sensor with f/1.8 aperture and 1.12µm pixel size, while the secondary
is 5 MP with depth sensor for background blur.
ZTE equipped the Blade V9 with a 3,100 mAh battery,
charged through the micro USB. The Blade V9 has Android Oreo out of the box and
connectivity options include Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.2 and NFC for the
64 GB variant.
There are two listings on JD.com - a version in
Aurora Blue with 4 GB RAM and 32 GB storage, and another variant, offered in
Black, with 64 GB storage. The phone can be pre-ordered now, but shipping and
sales begin on August 15.
