The top executive said that OnePlus’ India business wasn’t “significantly” impacted in India, which is reeling under the second wave of Covid-19.
NEW DELHI: Premium handset maker OnePlus is looking to deepen its investments in India to bolster its make in India strategy to achieve 100% local manufacturing for smart TVs and smartphones, and is devising a roadmap for its wider Internet of Things (IoT) products, founder and CEO Pete Lau told ET.
“We are looking into deeper investments in manufacturing and development of make in India strategy. This includes both for smart TV and smartphone bring pushed towards 100% local manufacturing as soon as possible. For our wider IoT products, we are looking at a parallel roadmap as we want to make products locally and increase the % of products that are made locally.” Lau said.
The top executive said that OnePlus’ India business wasn’t “significantly” impacted in India, which is reeling under the second wave of Covid-19.
“For a big part of this, we have worked to plan and forecast very early on very long term with our partners and our global business…going forward because we’ve made such long term planning, our roadmap will be more or less unaffected,” Lau said, adding the brand hasn’t changed its product roadmap.
The company is also continuing with its previously announced investments for research and development (R&D) in India despite the merger of its R&D team with Oppo at the group level.
OnePlus is investing Rs1,000 crore over three years to expand its India research and development centre, which will become its largest research facility globally by 2022.
“..the OnePlus R&D team hasn’t changed in India. it’s still as originally built out and is continued to be developed and managed and strengthened going forward…we are very much committed to the India market for the long term. I made this announcement about large scale investment in 2019… this is something that we very much continue to develop and grow going forward,” Lau said.
He said that OnePlus’ India R&D team is a very “important pillar” for both business in India and global operations.
The company saw its overall smartphone shipments grow 200% in Q4 2020 and 300% in Q1 2021, driven by its mid-range OnePlus Nord and OnePlus 8T smartphones.
OnePlus is now expanding its mid-range Nord series with the launch of Nord CE 5G along with a new smart TV. “We will continue the strategy to strengthen and to get more Indians to use our products. However, our focus on flagship products continues since it has created a strong reputation in the market.”
Under the IoT strategy, OnePlus will further bring new devices to Indian consumers this year.
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“We are working on IoT products seeing Covid situation…these products have an additional ability to support the lives of users in a way they didn’t have such a focus before Covid,” Lau said, adding that the response to its wearable products are encouraging for the overall development of the ecosystem.
The company launched its OnePlus smartwatch, smartband and TWS earphones earlier this year.
Lau, however, added that the company might not make all IoT products by itself, rather will provide connectivity through its devices to the wider ecosystem. “We are putting a lot of effort into looking forward to creating that level of connectivity.”
https://telecom.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/oneplus-co-founder-pete-lau-on-nord-ce-5g-rd-focus-manufacturing-investment-and-pandemic/83003702
