HTC may not have given up on smartphones just yet, but there is little left for consumers to stick around for. The Taiwanese OEM, which was once a contender for the pole position for the top Android smartphone brand, is now trying hard to attract new customers or even keep the old ones. HTC's plans for 2019 included focusing on existing U12+ flagships as well as releasing new phones. This plan does not seem to be going as well as, despite the Android Pie announcement in August 2018, HTC has now confirmed that several of its devices will not receive Android Pie sooner than Q2 2019.

HTC's update plans involved rolling out Android Pie to the HTC U11, U11+, U11 Life (based on Android One) and the U12+. Of these, only the U11 Life has managed to receive an update to Android Pie, despite launching with Android Nougat. The OEM has now taken more than 6 months to ensure that the update is "compatible" with its phones, which is a non-answer as devices like the HTC U12+ already come with a Treble-compatible partition setup. The tweet also does not confirm when exactly these updates would arrive, as the updates will be released "starting Q2'19", which in turn means that there is no upper limit to when the last of these devices can receive the update.

HTC U12+ XDA Forum HTC U11 XDA Forum HTC U11+ XDA Forum

HTC's sad state of affairs has led the company to consider licensing its brand to Indian smartphone brands like Micromax, Lava, and Karbonn. The lack of updates will not really add up to be a selling point for its upcoming smartphone, assuming there is one still in the works.

 Update 1: New Timeline

Over on Twitter, HTC now says that the Android Pie update is coming to the HTC U11 in late May and to the HTC U11+/HTC U12+ in June. It seems odd for the company to roll out the latest release to its current flagship after its previous generation flagship, but we don't really expect much from the company that's trying really hard to convince us it's not dead. In August of 2018, HTC confirmed that all 3 devices (and the U11 Life) would receive the Pie update, but so far only the Android One-powered U11 Life has received the update.