NEW DELHI: Lenovo’s answer to the Xiaomi invasion, the A6000 smartphone unveiled at CES 2015, will be launched on Friday, January 16. The company has sent out invites for an event in New Delhi, with an image clearly pointing to the smartphone’s 4G LTE capabilities.
The Lenovo A6000 is being targeted to take on 4G LTE offerings in the sub-Rs. 10,000 space, most specifically the Xiaomi Redmi Note 4G (now also available via Airtel), and Micromax’s Yu Yureka that’s due to become available to purchase on January 13. There’s no doubt Lenovo’s timing is intentional, stealing some steam from the launch of Xiaomi’s ‘new flagship’ unveiling on January 15 – though that is expected to be of the new Mi 5 flagship.
The Chinese consumer electronics giant will like Xiaomi and Micromax also be offering the Lenovo A6000 only for online sales – exclusively via Flipkart, which is also home to the Redmi family. The smartphone announced at CES was given a price tag of $169 (roughly Rs. 10,500), but Flipkart has confirmed the phone will be priced “below Rs. 10,000 in India.”
With Lenovo looking to compete with recent launches like Xiaomi Redmi Note 4G and Micromax’s Yu Yureka, the phone could be priced as low as Rs. 8,999. A Lenovo spokesperson said the A6000 variant showcased at CES 2015 is not compatible with the 2300MHz Band 40 (TDD-LTE) used by India’s 4G networks. However, given the company’s intention to compete with aforementioned phones, it’s likely that the variant launched in India will come with this feature.
The Lenovo A6000 features a 5-inch HD (720×1280 pixels) IPS display, which is smaller than 5.5-inch the display on both Micromax’s Yu Yureka and Xiaomi’s Redmi Note 4G. The dual-SIM smartphone supports Micro-SIM cards.
The A6000 is powered by a 64-bit quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 (MSM8916) SoC clocked at 1.2GHz coupled with 1GB of RAM. The Android 4.4 KitKat-based smartphone runs Lenovo’s Vibe UI 2.0 skin on top, and bears 8GB of built-in storage with no word on expandability.
Other specifications include an 8-megapixel autofocus rear camera with LED flash; a 2-megapixel front camera; apart from a 2300mAh battery rated to deliver up to 13 hours of talk time and up to 264 hours of standby time on 3G network. The Lenovo A6000 measures 141x70x8.2mm and weighs 128 grams.
