A trio of leading stories today so here they are, fast and loud:

First is the Huawei Mate X2, which launched in China yesterday:

• It’s Huawei’s first new foldable since its screen-on-the-outside Mate XS, and the Mate X2 is a complete redesign.
• It looks a lot like the Galaxy Z Fold 2 now with an in-folding design. The inner display is an 8-inch OLED with a resolution of 2480 x 2200, while the exterior screen is an OLED at 6.45 inches with a 2700 x 1160 resolution, and both have high-refresh rates at 90Hz, and there’s no gap when it’s shut.
• I want to talk more about this including the quad rear camera and specs, but because Huawei remains on the US blacklist, it runs EMUI 11.0 based on Android 10 without Google Mobile Services and won’t go on sale outside China. And the pricing is unreal: it’s listed at 17,999 yuan (~$2,785) for the 256GB storage model, and 18,999 yuan ($2,940) for 512GB.
• Which is super expensive, especially considering the Galaxy Z Fold 2 goes for $2,000, and that pricing in China is usually a little cheaper than global pricing.
• Now, Huawei said this phone will be one of the first to get Huawei’s new HarmonyOS, starting in April. Based on the first glimpses of that, it will look exactly like Android 10.

Second, there’s a big leak of the Pixel 5a, with renders from Steve “OnLeaks” Hemmerstoffer showing what looks exactly like the Pixel 4a 5G:

• I own the Pixel 4a 5G and it’s pretty tough to spot any differences. Which is fine given Google’s reasonable pricing on these almost-flagships.
• It’ll be a 6.2-inch FHD+ OLED if these leaks hold up.
• The listed dimensions at 156.2 x 73.2 x 8.8 mm (9.4 mm at the camera bump) for the Pixel 5a does make it a touch taller, narrower, and thicker than the Pixel 4a 5g (153.9 x 74 x 8.2 mm), while the camera bump was only 8.5mm.
• This is really an external view of the new phone — no details about specs like processor, RAM, storage, battery size, 5G, and so on.

Ambitious enough?

• Hemmerstoffer points out some opinion we’re going to see a lot: can Google release a Pixel 5a and have it make sense? The 4a 5G already felt a little bit like the Pixel 5 Lite, the Pixel 4a also exists, and now a Pixel 5a might confuse the issue more, given how similar they all are.
• That said, if Google can up the specs in a meaningful way, especially some improvements to the camera system, without raising the price, maybe there’s no reason to complain too loudly. 
• Though, I do think there’s a potential problem that Google isn’t being more ambitious.
• It’s possible this year’s expected Pixel 6 pushes flagship boundaries more, but that’s asking a lot of a Google team that stepped back from bleeding-edge after the flagship Pixel 4 series mixed a good phone with bad features including a stifled battery.

Third, all Samsung devices from 2019 or later will get four years of security updates.

• This is a big deal — with Samsung guaranteeing four years of important updates to all its devices, including phones and tablets, that extends the life of its devices and means the company has thrown down a challenge in the world of Android.
• It also beats Google at its own game — Pixel phones coming with a minimum of three years of software updates was best-in-class previously.
• But why now? Samsung didn’t reveal too much, but we’re seeing that Android 12 shows even major updates will become easier, while both device security and long-term sustainability are both bigger concerns than ever.