One of China’s leading smartphone makers Xiaomi launched their new smartphone the Mi Max in Beijing on Tuesday. This is the company’s first attempt in the big-screen smartphone market.
“For smartphones in the next generation, the screen will be bigger. And 6.44 inches is the perfect size,” said Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun at the launch party.
The Xiaomi Mi Max has a 6.44-inch screen. It is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 652 processor and Adreno 510 GPU and has 4GB RAM and 128GB ROM. Xiaomi claims its 4850mAh battery can ensure 14-hour video playing while connected to wifi. It has a fingerprint scanner on the back.
According to a January report by American research firm IDC, Xiaomi ranked fifth among the world’s top five smartphone vendors with 70.8 million shipments made in 2015. But that number fell short of Xiaomi’s 80 million sales goal for 2015. In IDC’s April report, the company even fell off the top five vendor list in terms of Q1 2016 shipments.
Xiaomi also launched its new smartphone operating system MIUI8 at the launch party on Tuesday. With MIUI8, a smartphone can have two independent systems. Lei said at the launch party that global MIUI users have reached 200 million. Xiaomi will come up with a developer version of MIUI8 on June 17.
The Mi Max comes in three colors and is priced at RMB 1,999 (USD 306). Xiaomi also provides a 3GB RAM and 64GB ROM version priced at RMB 1,699, and a 3GB RAM and 32GB ROM version for RMB 1,499 with a Snapdragon 650 processor.
The Mi Max can now be pre-ordered on Xiaomi’s official website Mi.com. It will go on sale on Mi.com and e-commerce platforms Tmall.com and JD.com on May 17.
(All photos are provided by Xiaomi)
