Unveiling its first curved smartphone, the G Flex, on Tuesday, LG Electronics expressed its confidence in taking the lead in the nascent flexible smartphone market.

“The G Flex is one that shows the right direction for flexible smartphones, and even smart gadgets such as smart watches, to follow. LG will maintain its high reputation in the flexible smartphone market,” said Ma Chang-min, vice president of LG Electronics’ domestic marketing division, at a press conference.

The Seoul-based electronics giant is trying to gain traction with high-end smartphone models, such as the G2, in the fiercely competitive business environment. LG lost ground to Chinese smartphone makers Huawei and Lenovo during the third quarter of this year, according to leading American market research firm International Data Corporation.

Huawei snatched the third spot in the global smartphone rankings, shipping 12.5 million units during the period, while Lenovo ranked fourth with 12.3 million units, followed by LG with 12 million.

LG Electronics’ vice chairman Koo Bon-joon showed confidence in the sales of the new curved smartphone.

“The vice chairman said the G Flex had received a good response for its design from the three major mobile carriers (SK Telecom, KT, and LG Uplus),” said Kwon Bong-seok, senior vice president of LG’s mobile communications company.

The G Flex is scheduled to go on sale in Korea starting next Tuesday through mobile carriers. However, its global release date has not yet been set.

“We are now in discussions with global telecommunications firms. The curved smartphone is expected to be available in the U.S., Japanese, and European markets,” Kwon said.

The G Flex boasts a curved, 6-inch, 1280x720-pixel organic light-emitting display screen, as well as a curved 3,500 mAh battery. It is equipped with a 2.26 GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800 processor, 2 GB of RAM, a 13-megapixel rear-facing camera and a 2.1-megapixel front-facing camera.

The smartphone, inheriting the rear volume and power buttons from the preceding G2 model, runs on the Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean operating system, not on the Android 4.4. KitKat released together with the Nexus 5 last Thursday.

LG said it was too early to release another product running on the latest operating system after the Nexus 5, also made by the Korean firm.

By Kim Young-won (wone0102@heraldcorp.com)