Ten years ago, when Chinese mobile multinational TECNO entered the African market, TECNO phones were largely considered unsophisticated, low budget, and would not dare compete with renowned high-end brands like Apple or Samsung. The brand was barely acknowledged as valuable. That was ten years ago.
Today, TECNO has comfortably positioned itself as a force to be reckoned with, not just in terms of brand penetration and market dominance in Africa, but also in terms of its use of high-end tech, the input of advanced features, and some of the most innovative designs in the mobile phone industry globally. Out of over 35 African countries where TECNO is present, the brand is currently retaining the largest market share of 41.1 percent and 31.1 percent in Tanzania and Nigeria alone. While serving about 2.5 billion consumers across the globe.
On Sunday, September 25, 2016, while celebrating its 10th anniversary in regional markets, TECNO officially launched its flagship duo – the Phantom 6 and Phantom 6 plus, the fourth generation in the Phantom series. The event which took place at the world’s tallest building, the magnificent Armani Hotel in Burj Khalifa, Dubai, was significant for a number of reasons; the Phantom 6 and Phantom 6 Plus are TECNO’s most innovative and disruptive devices yet, they are also among some of the most competitive smartphones to enter the mobile market in the last quarter of the year, but more importantly, it marked the brand’s entrance into new markets in the Middle East and South America.
Dubbed beauty and the beast, the Phantom 6 and Phantom 6 plus are unarguably several steps forward in terms of quality, design, battery power, camera, memory, and security. TECNO Phantom 6 wears an ultra slim design with premium chamfered edges, sporting the brand’s first dual rear camera technology – a high definition combination of 13-megapixel auto-focus and 5-megapixel fixed-focus Sony cameras with LED flash.
The phone screen is advanced FHD AMOLED guaranteed to deliver vivid pictures and great video experience with a viewing angle of 180 degrees. The sleek beauty has an expanded internal storage space, powered by 3GB RAM for smoother operations with 32GB ROM leg room, expandable to 128GB. The phone enjoys improved processor speed at 2.0 GHz, MediaTek’s Helio P10 chipset. As Attai Oguche, Deputy Marketing Lead of TECNO Nigeria aptly puts it, “TECNO Phantom 6 gives mobile consumers better stability, speed and possibly the best camera experience on a mobile phone.”
TECNO Phantom 6 Plus comes with an impressive 6.0-inch IPS touch display and hosts the mobile brand’s first tri-fold security combination (fingerprint, eye scanner, and a free Trustlook antivirus). Rest assured your phone is super-secured as there’s no getting past those. The Phantom 6 Plus has the latest MediaTek Helio X20 deca-core processor and a 4GB RAM, which does not only make it one of the fastest mobile phones in the market but also one that can run 32 apps simultaneously without crashing. Even with all that activity, the Phantom 6 Plus performs 70 percent better and saves battery by 30 percent. According to Vane Ni, TECNO’s global marketing lead, mobile consumers in Nigeria, Ghana, Egypt and other top mobile markets in emerging economies have not seen anything like the Phantom 6 plus.
“The Phantom 6 plus took three years in the making and the global expertise of over five hundred engineers to deliver right on schedule.” – Vane Ni
TECNO Phantom 6 plus flaunts a 21-megapixel rear Sony camera with dual flash, and an 8-megapixel front camera with a soft flash. Phantom 6 plus has an expanded 64GB internal memory, which can accommodate 25 HD movies or 12,000 songs. It also comes with a hybrid sim setup (two sim cards, or one and a memory card) and a revolutionary USB type C port that allows for light speed charging and data transfer.
The launch of TECNO’s latest flagship duo clearly shows that the brand should be taken seriously as it is raising the bar on technological advancements while maintaining its novel strategy of a pocket-friendly price; Phantom 6 costs a little over N80,000 ($260/270) and the Phantom 6 plus costs over N120,000 and comes with a compact remote-controlled tripod if pre-ordered.
