In case you kept track of smartphone trends in Asia this year, the spec should not surprise you. The phone is based on a MTK6752 processor with eight 64-bit Cortex-A53 CPU cores and Mali T760 graphics. The 5.5-inch panel is a 720p unit, so the SoC does not have to work too hard to keep everything smooth. The addition of 3GB of RAM should help as well, not to mention LTE connectivity. A fingerprint sensor is on board as well, right next to the Sony 13-megapixel camera.

Mlais is a very young Hong Kong smartphone outfit. The export brand launched on Christmas, but it already has a number of competitively priced smartphones. As part of our ongoing coverage of commoditised Android, we had a chance to test the Mlais M4 Note and Mlais M52. While these two models were ?inspired by? the Xiaomi Redmi Note and Samsung Galaxy Note 4, the new Mlais M7 tries to be original ? it's not a clone and it takes its design cues from a range of different products.
The end result is a sleek phone with a good tactile feeling. Despite the low price, the Mlais M7 feels robust and the choice of materials doesn't leave room for complaints. You get a stainless steel frame and matte, rubberized plastic on the back.

Let's take a closer look.