Honor "X40" smartphones are touted to launch with a Huawei Mate 50-esque design and 1-inch flagship-grade camera sensors

The CEO of Honor's mobile division in China, Kang Hairong Harrison, has just strongly hinted at a next-gen smartphonw with yet another round camera hump via Weibo. The executive has intimated that the design echoes the double rainbow scene captured in Bejing and posted to Weibo using a Magic4 Ultimate Edition; however, it is more likely that the OEM is still working through the IP taken with it after its split from Huawei and that the upcoming unit is, thus, a potential Mate 50-series clone.

The device in question - now thought to launch as a resurrection of the premium mid-range Vx0 series - might be one of many upcoming handsets hinted at in a new Digital Chat Station post. The famous leaker seems to believe that 1 will launch with a main camera sensor with the latest sought-after 1-inch form-factor, whereas another might have a primary shooter with more of a 1/1.1-inch size.

That is not all for the future of Honor's camera-centric reputation: Digital Chat Station now also asserts that it is on the brink of joining the custom in-house silicon brigade with an inaugural "AON" chipset. It is now touted to make certain functions such as Face Unlock, stock camera-app initializations and hands-free gesture controls 'always-on' while reducing the battery power required to "extreme" lows.

In addition, the putative AON chip is said to act as an "independent ISP", thereby joining the ranks of others such as the Xiaomi Surge C-series and Vivo V-series co-processors. It is not clear whether the supposedly upcoming Honor V40 successor will launch as a first-gen AON smartphone, although Digital Chat Station is adamant that the OEM has produced a "mystery prototype" with the technology already.

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