There aren’t a lot of success stories in the incredibly competitive mobile industry of the last few years that started from literal scratch, but OnePlus is definitely the first brand that comes to mind when thinking about such a rise from nothing.
Led by the visionary minds of co-founders Pete Lau and Carl Pei, the company needed just a few years to break into the extremely challenging US market while positioning itself as a budget-friendly yet premium alternative to the likes of Apple and Samsung pretty much around the world.
At the same time, there’s a good chance the Essential acquisition had more to do with patents, especially related to smart home technology, than the actual brand and its mainstream popularity (or lack thereof) in the global smartphone market.
