'India Is Super Important For Us'

Pete Lau, founder and CEO, OnePlus, on making Bengaluru the company’s second global headquarters

- Anshul Dhamija

 In just four years since its inception, the Shenzhen headquartered OnePlus, which only makes smartphones that are priced above $400 (about ₹27,000), has raked in revenues of about $1.4 billion as of calendar year 2017. India has emerged as the biggest market for OnePlus, accounting for a little over one-third of the company’s total revenue. Ahead of the launch of its latest smartphone, the OnePlus 6, on May 17, Pete Lau, the company’s 43-year-old founder and chief executive officer, spoke to Forbes India about its fan base in India and building a global reputation. Accompanying him was his assistant Eric Gass who interpreted the conversation. Edited excerpts:

Q What got you to change track from selling Blu-ray players at Oppo Electronics to setting up OnePlus and selling smartphones?

Towards the end of 2013, there was a clear realisation—the internet is a model for doing business combined with best-in-class products. At the time, companies in China were focusing on ecommerce, a lot of which was characterised by delivering goods that were available for cheap. The way I saw it, people wanted premium products, and there could be an internet business model built around it.