China's Honor launches AI-enhanced Magic 6 Pro smartphone

Chinese technology company Honor on Sunday globally launched its new Magic 6 Pro smartphone and showcased an experimental eye-tracking AI function that enables users to remotely open and move their car just by looking at their phone screen.

The tool is already available in China and the company is working to integrate it commercially overseas.

Honor, sold by Huawei Technologies [RIC:RIC:HWT.UL] in November 2020, and now belonging to state-owned Shenzhen Zhixin New Information Technology Co, had until Sunday released its new phone exclusively in China.

Tech and telecom companies are releasing new products and features ahead of the annual Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona set to kick off Monday, hoping the buzz around generative AI will boost business prospects.

Makers of smartphones hope the excitement around AI will help boost a sluggish market for smartphones, though many experts say generative AI may raise legal or ethical concerns.

Read also: Xiaomi launches new photo-geared 14 Series smartphone

The company, which competes with the likes of Apple (AAPL.O), opens new tab and Oppo for a share of China's smartphone market, is also working to globally integrate the so-called LlaMA 2 large language model (LLM), a tool similar to ChatGPT, into its phone.

In 2023, Apple had a 17.3% market share in China, while Honor had 16.8%, according to International Data Corporation.

Honor on Sunday is also launching its new MagicBook Pro 16 laptop, with an AI feature allowing users to move applications like messaging apps between devices, for example from an Android smartphone to a Windows PC, with a single drag.

"We firmly believe in the transformative power of collaborative synergy, especially in the era of AI," said the company's CEO George Zhao in a statement.