The coolest new smartphone feature we probably won’t see in South Africa

Qualcomm’s new flagship chipset, the Snapdragon 845, promises leaps forward in mobile computing technology.
It provides improved machine learning and imaging performance, a dedicated secure processing unit, and the X20 Gigabit LTE modem.
The X20 includes several features, one of which is “Dual SIM Dual VoLTE” support.
This means it can use two SIMs to connect to two LTE networks at once, maintain data connections to both networks, and make and receive voice-over-LTE calls on either SIM.
It is unlikely that South Africans will get to use this feature, however.
The Snapdragon 845 is set to power new flagship Android smartphones launching in 2018, and South African mobile operators typically do not sell dual-SIM variants of flagship devices.
While there are several low-end dual-SIM smartphones available, the same is not true for higher-end devices – despite the availability of hybrid dual-SIM models elsewhere in the world.
“Hybrid dual-SIM” means you can either install a second SIM, or a microSD card, but not both, in your device.
While the hardware for dual-SIM smartphones is available, operators in countries like the United States and South Africa request that manufacturers disable it in units sold locally.