LG Electronics has introduced a bigger-screen version of its large screen G Pro smartphone on Thursday, February 13 in a bid to move to the top 3 spot in worldwide smartphone sales this year, Reuters reported.

The South Korea-based firm currently sits at the fourth spot and is looking to overtake Huawei Technologies Co Ltd and Lenovo Group. The latter has agreed to acquire the Motorola handset division from Google Inc in a $2.9 billion deal. If regulators would allow the deal to proceed, Lenovo would be pushed from its current Number 5 spot to Number 3. Executives at LG Electronics have brushed off this threat, the report said.

LG Electronics Head of Mobile Product Planning Andy Kim told reporters, "The Lenovo-Motorola deal has created a great media buzz, but this has not been much talked about within our company."

LG Electronics unveiled its G Pro 2 ahead of market leader and rival Samsung Electronics which is expected to come out with a product offering later this month. Meanwhile, Apple Inc is also expected to unveil a larger screen iPhone within the year, the report said.

The G Pro 2 comes with a 5.9-inch screen, notably larger than its predecessor's 5.5-inch screen. It is one of the biggest-screened phones available today. An innovation in G Pro 2 which is considered a first for smartphones is the 1-watt speaker system which will be powered by a Snapdragon 800 processor from Qualcomm. Users can bypass passwords by simply tapping patterns of their own choosing on the screen with their fingers, the report said.

The new phone will first be available in Korea late this month before it is rolled out to other markets in Asia, China included, where smartphone customers prefer bigger screens. LG Electronics did not wish to comment on what it has cooked up for Western markets, Reuters reported.