OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei publically apologized for the company’s mishandling of the launch of its second-generation smartphone. Similar to last year’s well-reviewed, but initially hard-to-get OnePlus One smartphone, the new OnePlus 2 has been difficult to order and, according to Pei, has only started shipping “in meaningful quantities this week.”

After broken promises and more delays, Pei recognizes that this stumble has had an adverse affect on the company’s relationships with partners, with its reputation in the smartphone industry, and with customers that have been patiently waiting for their devices.

oneplus 2

OnePlus is a very new company. It made waves in 2014 when it launched the OnePlus One, a high-quality smartphone with a mid-range price. However, the OnePlus One was still only available via invitation until spring of this year. By then, a lot of people had simply moved on.

With the launch of the second-generation device, the company has had a harder time standing out. The phone has to compete with other high-quality phones with mid-range prices such as the Motorola Moto X Pure and Asus Zenfone 2. And some have complained that the OnePlus 2 is missing “flagship killer” features such as NFC capability and a microSD card slot. So some potential customers may already be looking at other low-cost devices the fit their needs.

Yes, an open apology from OnePlus’ co-founder is a positive move from the fledgling company. It is refreshing to see a bit of humanity in an industry of cold, hard technology. However, saying sorry won’t add an NFC chip and microSD card slot to the OnePlus 2, nor will it reverse time and make the device easy to buy, as was promised by the company earlier this year.

We tend to root for the underdog, and OnePlus is under the shadow of some very massive big dogs. But, how many more blunders will the company make before consumers just give up and find someone new to support?

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10 replies on “OnePlus apologizes for poorly executed OnePlus 2 launch”

  1. Yes Generally its not a bright idea to Launch a product that isn’t really available…AGAIN !!!!

  2. Don’t think I’ll be buying a Oneplus Two. Lack of NFC, lack of supply (I’m 200k on the invite list but have received nothing yet), and tbh lack of software support. This may be a one-off but I moved from cyanogenOS to cyanogenmod nightlies to get new features, recently I’ve tried to go back but all the images have disappeared from their official sources. The only thing I could find was oxygen OS or whatever Oneplus’s official rom is called but that’s still based on android 5.0.2 with no OTA updates available. Thinking I’d be better off with a nexus 6 this time around.

  3. They’re just allowing importers to profit from this in countries where it has the same GSM bands as China.

  4. I feel like the hour of newcomer companies like Oneplus has come and passed. There was a very brief window of opportunity for them to take advantage of the low-cost high-value unlocked smartphone market. Oneplus failed. Their distribution efforts were poor the first time around. There was no shortage of demand, and they failed to supply.

    If I want to spend $150-400 on a great unlocked phone, I don’t need to order directly from a fly-by-night company with a reputation for unreliable supply.

    The “cut out the middle man” business model sounds good in theory, but it ultimately doesn’t deliver what the consumer wants. I’ve bought my last 2 phones on Amazon, because I know that when I click the order button, it will be at my door 2 days later.

    Oneplus shouldn’t feel bad about that. Even Google did a piss-poor job at selling directly, and ultimately they embraced the retail model.

    1. But Google has reputations that completely overshadow their shitty device sales management. OnePlus has nothing. OnePlus f-ked up big time and there’s no patching things now.

      1. Precisely. They had an open stage, they had the only great value unlocked smartphone (flagship specs, and under $400) for a full year. It wasn’t long before someone with the manufacturing capability would eclipse them. The Zenfone 2 put them in the grave. Now their 2nd model looks just as good, but there’s no chance I’d buy it over the Moto X Pure.

  5. I personally don’t see why anyone would get this over the Moto X Pure unless they are a loyal OnePlus supporter.

    1. Because if like me you live in a country where you can’t easily buy a Motorola device at all, but recently have been able to buy OPO devices. Moto has a TOTALLY screwed-up distribution chain where I live in S.E. Asia (thank-you Lenovo). Not to say I would actually buy an OPO device – the way OPO does business bothers me.

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