'Over 1.5 Million OnePlus One Smartphones Sold Across 35 Countries'

OnePlus co-founder, Carl Pei, in a recent interview has revealed that the company has managed to sell more than 1.5 million OnePlus One smartphone across 35 countries since its launch. While talking to Wall Street Journal (WSJ), Pei stressed that the OnePlus One performed better than expected in its first year.

Talking about where he sees the company, Pei said that OnePlus can be positioned between affordable smartphone makers such as Xiaomi and premium players such as Apple and Samsung. On being asked about how OnePlus can compete against Apple and Samsung, the company's 25-year-old co-founder said, "You are innovative; you become big; you become slow; the market changes; you die off. Of course the big guys are going to be disrupted by the small guys."

(Also see: OnePlus 2 Touted as '2016 Flagship Killer')

Further explaining how the market has changed, "Traditionally, consumers with little information use a mental shortcut and think a higher price equals a better product. With the transparency of the Internet and user reviews, this entire equation is changing. Not only for smartphones, but also for restaurants, and for everything," he added. To refresh, OnePlus One smartphone was globally announced in April last year.

The company had been sticking with an invite-system for its One (Review | Pictures) smartphone ever since it began shipping the smartphone in June. While the invite-system pulled a lot of negative feedback from consumers, Pei said that the company needed to keep the handset's demand and supply balanced. It is also worth appreciating how the company managed to finally reach the milestone by just selling one product (with two storage variants) in select markets only and via the invite-system only. It removed the invite system in April this year.

To recall, OnePlus at the beginning of 2015 claimed that close to 1 million '2014 flagship killer' aka OnePlus One smartphones had sold. The Chinese smartphone maker in November last year had said it expected to touch the 1-million mark in 2014, but was not able to do so.

OnePlus is set to launch its OnePlus 2 smartphone at a virtual reality event on July 27.