2023-08-04 06:56:02
04 August 2023 09:40 04 Aug 2023 09:40 | Share
OnePlus founder Carl Pei has founded a new brand, CMF, a subsidiary of his Nothing company. Under it, he intends to produce low-cost mobile phones, smart watches and headphones to compete with Redmi and Realme. The first devices will see the light before the end of 2023.
Target – Xiaomi
Nothing company announced the launch of a new subsidiary brand CMF, under which it will produce low-cost smartphones and various gadgets. The founder of Nothing is Carl Pei, who was at the origins of the famous OnePlus brand.
In its concept, CMF resembles Redmi, a subsidiary brand of Xiaomi, under which, since January 2019, it has been releasing relatively inexpensive smartphones and other equipment with relatively competitive technical characteristics. Previously, it was only a line of Xiaomi smartphones. According to Neowin, Redmi, along with Realme, is likely to become the main competitor of CMF.
Realme is a Chinese smartphone manufacturer that is directly affiliated with OnePlus. Both companies are part of the VVK holding, and their devices are officially shipped to Russia, like Redmi products. Whether the “white” import of CMF gadgets to Russia would be organized was not known by the time the material was released.
When the new OnePlus didn’t work the first time
Having founded Nothing, Carl Pei once more focused on the release of smartphones, but he failed to make a second OnePlus. While OnePlus produced low-cost smartphones with top-end features, which it called “flagship killers,” in the early stages, Nothing immediately focused on releasing relatively expensive devices.
The first logo of the new brand
As of August 4, 2023, Nothing had two almost identical smartphones in terms of appearance – Phone 1 and Phone 2, the main feature of which is a very unusual design with “glyphs” – a very original backlight. However, Phone 2, having flagship hardware, costs less than many other flagships outside of Russia – for a 6.7-inch OLED screen, 8 GB of RAM and 128 GB of internal memory, as well as a Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 processor Nothing asks for $ 599 (56.2 thousand rubles at the exchange rate of the Central Bank as of August 4, 2023).
The company also produces wireless headphones and is preparing to compete with Apple in the segments of tablet computers and smart watches.
As for the CMF brand, which was announced personally by Carl Pei, inexpensive devices with a “clean and timeless design” will come out under it.
Listen first, call later
Users interested in purchasing CMF smartphones, which may well be successors to the original OnePlus, will have to wait, and for how long – Carl Pei did not specify. The Neowin portal writes that the first devices of the new brand, which is going to compete with Redmi, will be several models of headphones and smart watches.
Carl Pei plans to release all this before the end of 2023. Despite the fact that CMF is a “daughter” of Nothing, the new company will have its own development team. This gives hope for the original design of devices, and not for an external copy of the products of the parent brand.
It is possible that the design of CMF smartphones will resemble Nothing devices
To speed up the release of new products, including smartphones, CMF will need money – for research and development, staff expansion, orders to manufacturers, etc. Nothing held a round of investments, during which it raised regarding $96 million.
Carl Pei did not then go into details on what exactly the money would be directed to. Perhaps he will invest them in the development of CMF.
The wider the choice, the better.
The launch of a new brand by an established businessman in the smartphone market can be directly beneficial to end consumers. A new player in the budget and mid-range segments of the global smartphone market is likely to shake up Redmi, Realme and its other representatives and impose additional competition on them. As a result, consumers can expect better devices for less money.
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As for the release of CMF in Russia, in the current realities, it is hardly worth waiting until official distribution is established. For example, OnePlus smartphones have been entering the country without hindrance since 2014, including through the AliExpress trading platform, and a new official distributor appeared for the brand only at the end of spring 2023.
The main thing is that buyers of CMF smartphones imported under “gray” schemes do not face blocking of devices. As CNews reported, mobile phones from OnePlus, Realme and other brands of the VVK holding imported from abroad were remotely blocked in Russia and did not allow calling and sending SMS messages.
For Nothing, however, this was not noticed at the time of publication of the material.
Georgy Dorofeev
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