OnePlus Launches OnePlus 7, 7 Pro

Premium smartphone maker OnePlus unveiled the latest generation of its smartphones — OnePlus 7 and OnePlus 7 Pro at a global launch event in Bengaluru.

The Chinese company also said it is aggressively expanding its retail presence in India and will set up its largest experience centre in Hyderabad.

“This year, we are going to open three new experience stores.. We will open an experience store in Pune, and Hyderabad —which will be the biggest OnePlus store in the world (with 16,000 sq ft of space),” OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei said.

The company already has experience centres in Bengaluru, Delhi and Chennai.

Smartphone makers like Xiaomi, OnePlus and Motorola had started their operations in India through e-commerce platforms and have eventually expanded to the offline route as well. Offline retail still accounts for a big chunk of phone sales in India.

India is a key market for OnePlus and accounted for a significant part of the company’s revenues last year. OnePlus has previously stated that India is set to become the “second home ground” for the Chinese smartphone maker.

OnePlus 7 will be priced at:

• 6GB RAM version: Rs 32,999
• 8GB RAM version: Rs 37,999

The OnePlus 7 Pro will be available in three variants — 6GB, 8GB and 12GB — priced between Rs 48,999, Rs 52,999 and Rs 57,999 respectively.

The OnePlus 7 Pro features a 6.67-inch display, a triple-lens rear camera setup and has 4,000 mAh battery.

According to Counterpoint Research, Samsung had 44 percent share of the premium smartphone (Rs 30,000 and above) market in India in the January-March 2019 quarter. OnePlus had 26 percent share, while Apple had 19 percent share in the said quarter.

The category is expected to grow by 30 percent this year in India, the report added.

In March this year, Samsung had unveiled three devices – Galaxy S10+, S10 and S10e – as part of its flagship Galaxy S series that was priced between Rs 55,900-1.18 lakh in India.

Rival Apple’s base models of iPhone XR and XS are priced Rs 76,900 and Rs 99,900, respectively. Huawei has also upped its ante in the segment with the introduction of P30 for Rs 71,990, while Google – which unveiled its latest Pixel 3a and 3a XL for Rs 39,999 onwards – will start shipping these from Wednesday.―Bloomberg Quint