While China has a huge population which also means a huge potential market, the US is also another market that Chinese companies cannot ignore. This is why the company has for the past year or so revealed that they do plan to eventually make their phones available stateside, although no specific dates have been mentioned save for “near future”.However it looks like we could have a very rough timeline in the next 1-2 years, or at least that’s what it seems based on an interview that Xiaomi’s Hugo Barra did with the folks over at Engadget. According to Barra, he claims that it will probably be 1-2 years before the company is ready for the US.
In the meantime though it looks like they are already taking steps to prepare themselves and educate themselves on the US market and its technology. According to Barra, “Earlier this year we had a special version of Mi 5 that we made just for testing in the US, just so that we can start testing and doing small-field trials to sharpen our chops, if you will.”
He also adds, “And now we have Mi Note 2 which is another device that we can use for some field testing in the US. That’s again just another small step in the right direction or in the direction of being able to launch full-on products there.” Xiaomi is known for their affordable and value for money phones, some of which sport some pretty interesting designs, so it will be interesting to see how they fare against the more established players in the US market.
Filed in . Read more about Xiaomi.