LG will reportedly unveil the LG G4 next month, and sources say the second-biggest South Korean smartphone maker will take the wraps off a new flagship smartphone with a curved display.
Sources cited by the Korea Herald say LG is planning to make the big reveal about its next flagship smartphone before the end of April. If the sources' claim is true, the G4 will be the first flagship to build upon the company's line of G Flex curved display smartphones.
The report confirms what other sources have mentioned to the Korea Times last month. One insider said that LG decided not to release its latest flagship at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) earlier this month because Samsung was also unveiling its own Galaxy S6 at the same event.
"Samsung usually releases its new flagship model in the first quarter of each year, and Apple in the second quarter," said one source. "We need some in-between time to make a bigger splash."
Official details about the upcoming LG smartphone are scant to nearly non-existent, but several rumors attributed to LG insiders who asked not to be named have surfaced. Based on these rumors, we have built a picture of a 5.3-inch sapphire Quad-HD display running on Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon 810 system on a chip, the same one that powers the G Flex 2 unveiled earlier at the MWC, and 3GB of RAM. Rumor also has it that the G4 will have a 16MP camera, a microSD card reader, and will run on Android Lollipop 5.0.2 or 5.1.
One LG official told the Korea Times that the details and specifications of the G4 have been sent to top outlet channels and European mobile carriers, and the initial response was "good enough." The G4 will reportedly be launched in Europe and the U.S. but not in China. LG is aiming for 10 million sales of the G4, while analysts expect sales in the range of 9 million to 15 million units for the upcoming flagship.
"LG knows this year will be very crucial whether to maintain a stable lead as the world's third-biggest smartphone producer in annual sales by widening gaps with our Chinese rivals, such as Xiaomi," said the official. "LG will actively respond."
Last year, LG sold a total of 59.6 million smartphones riding on the back of the robust smartphone sales of the LG G3. The figure was up from 46.7 million units sold in 2013.
