Huawei Throws Shade On The iPhone 6S' "Rose Gold" Variant, As It Copies The Color On Its Mate S Model

Imitation may well be the best form of flattery, but if you’re another phone company and you’re copying Apple’s flagships, you better watch out—for patent lawsuits.

For those who closely follow Chinese smartphones’ development, it would be no surprise to them that Chinese companies churn out “iPhones,” or at least iPhone clones, by the dozen.

Asia is a hotbed of a device copycat industry. Clones of flagship devices are sold in bulk, only to be resold in retail stores and online stores in most Asian countries. Samsung and Apple are the two companies that bear the brunt of the most imitations.

But to have an established brand, one of the Top 3 Smartphone makers at that, create an almost exact clone of another brand they almost knocked off the Top 3, at least in China, the move is foul.

And Huawei couldn’t even resist throwing shade at the phone they copied: Reports say that the company threw shade at Apple’s Rose Gold variant on Twitter:

“#HuaweiMateS in #RoseGold, from head to toe.” Source: https://twitter.com/HuaweiDevice/status/641836413659451392

Yes, Huawei Mate S copied the iPhone’s “Rose Gold” and didn’t even bother to rebrand the variant. A previous report stated that Huawei rebranded the color into “Coral Pink,” however, a check into the company’s official consumer page states that they went forward with the “Rose Gold” name.

According to reports, other features were copied as well. One such feature is the iPhone 6S’ “Force Touch” function. Huawei simply rebranded this as “3D Touch” technology. The camera technology on the Huawei Mate S was also said to be copied straight off the iPhone. In spite of the fact that the Huawei Mate S has a 13MP camera, while the iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus have a 12MP camera, the Huawei Mate S is said to incorporate the exact same RGBW sensor that the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus’ cameras have. The Huawei Mate S’ optical image stabilization feature is also said to be a page off of the iPhone 6S, as well.

For a clone, then, it’s funny that Huawei priced the device at a premium €800, which is around $907.84 USD.

No matter, it’s still worth looking at the Huawei Mate S’ specs:

Processor/Chipset: Octa-core HiSilicon Kirin 935, consisting of a 2.2 GHz quad-core processor, and a 1.5 GHz quad-core processor

RAM: 3GB

GPU: Mali-T628 MP4

OS: Android OS, v5.1.1 (Lollipop)

Internal Storage: 32/64/128 GB

Connectivity: GSM, HSPA, LTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n

Expandable Storage: MicroSD, up to 128 GB

Display: 5.5 inch AMOLED capacitative touchscreen, 16M colors, with an output of 1080 x 1920 pixels in resolution and a ~401 ppi pixel density; protected with Corning Gorilla Glass 4

Cameras: Primary: 13MP with a max output of 4128 x 3096 pixels, autofocus, optical image stabilization, dual-LED (dual tone) flash; Secondary: 8MP with LED flash

Battery: Non-removable 2700 mAh battery

Colors: Rose Gold, Luxurious Gold, Mystic Champagne, Titanium Grey

While some consumers are definitely into the iPhone for the brand, and others won’t even bat an eyelash when they pick up a knockoff by another main brand, there are still so many implications of this tide of copying other companies’ devices.

One question begs to be asked: “Is there really nothing original on the market anymore, that companies are just copying off of each other?”

Let’s see how the next five years plays out. Within that time, consumers will surely get so bored with device ennui.