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In 2016, Chinese manufacturer ZTE launched an affordable flagship smartphone named ZTE Axon 7, which stopped shipping now. The fans eagerly expected the successor ZTE Axon 8, but the company confirmed it would skip the number 8, jumping to 9. So, with this, ZTE confirms the existence of the Axon 7 successor, ZTE Axon 9. Interestingly, Wi-Fi Alliance certified a ZTE smartphone with model number Z2321U, which was suspected to be the Axon 8.
IFeng reported this news on the launch of the ZTE foldable smartphone, the Axon M, in China. The company’s CEO, Lixin Cheng himself, confirmed the launch. It is speculated that the skip is done to avoid translational errors. Axon translates to “Sky machine” in Chinese, but ‘Sky machine 8″ translates into “mess-up” in that language. This may be the reason, but they will not be the first company to do that. Previously, Chinese smartphone manufacturer OnePlus skipped from the OnePlus 3 to the OnePlus 5.
The company announced the ZTE Axon 7 would be discontinued but promised the successor’s launch soon. As for the Wi-Fi certification, the only piece of information that we could gather is that the device will run on Android 8.1 Oreo, which is currently available only for the Pixel and Nexus devices.
The device announcement suggests the launch will be early this year. It speculated the device will be unveiled at Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2018, to be held next month from February 28 to March 1 in Barcelona, Spain.
