BusinessWeek: How Xiaomi plans to beat Apple outside of China

BusinessWeek magazine, as part of its latest issue of The Global Tech, talks about the Chinese company Xiaomi, a rapidly rising star in the technology market, which has already flooded China with its cheap but functional smartphones, and is now beginning to expand internationally. The goal is nothing less than to grab market share from Apple, which Xiaomi plans to defeat with $130 smartphones and its own MIUI mobile firmware based on Android.

the “Chinese Apple” for its careful approach to design and charismatic founder Lei Jun Xiaomi is regularly called . The company has even developed a similar cult status in China: tens of thousands of people wait for each presentation, and new smartphones are sold out in a few minutes. In 2013, the company sold 18.7 million smartphones, and this year it plans to sell 60 million.

From the BusinessWeek article you can also find out:

1. For more than four years, Lei Jun and his partners have been working 12 hours a day, six days a week. The same schedule - from 10 am to 10 pm from Monday to Saturday - is recommended for other top managers of the company. Although the recommendation is not mandatory, most Xiaomi department heads strive to follow it. At the same time, Lay, as his associates assure, can work one hundred hours a week.

2. Xiaomi generally likes strict time schedules and control over their implementation: from the very beginning it was decided that the MIUI firmware, which is installed on the company’s smartphones, would receive updates every week. This is what happens. When updating the system, developers take into account feedback received from users within seven days.

3. Back in 2011, Lei Jun chose a style that makes him constantly compared to Steve Jobs: jeans with a black top (only the Apple founder had a turtleneck, and the head of Xiaomi had a shirt or T-shirt). He himself does not like comparisons with Jobs, although he admits that Apple and its creator have always inspired him.

4. Xiaomi will not join the list of Chinese technology companies going public. In an interview with the author of BusinessWeek, the head of the company said that this definitely will not happen in the next five years: Xiaomi will focus on improving the quality of products and services for now.

5. The company's first smartphone, Mi-One, in its initial versions caused a lot of complaints from users. The company did not recall large quantities of the device from the market, but quickly deployed a network of small workshops (including on the basis of already existing small handicraft companies for repairing mobile phones). Signs with the Xiaomi brand filled the streets of Chinese cities: the problem that caused mass smartphone repairs turned out to be good advertising.

6. Lei Jun believes that the iPhone remains the best smartphone on the planet. Simply because Xiaomi has not yet conquered the global market. At some point, Jun is sure, the quality characteristics of smartphones, their design and application ecosystems will become equal; price will remain the main selection criterion. Then the best smartphones on the planet will be produced by Xiaomi.

7. This year the company plans to enter the markets of 10 more countries: Russia, India, Brazil, Mexico, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and Turkey. The company expects that the appearance of Xiaomi smartphones in new markets by 2015 will increase their sales to 100 million gadgets.

8. Xiaomi considers maximum focus on fan users to be its important advantage. “If we treat them like gods, we will be weak. We need to treat our users like good friends and help solve their problems.” Geeky fans hunt for fleas in MIUI updates every week, with 1,200 fans testing the Xiaomi Mi2 smartphone model before its launch in 2012. Due to the geekiness of the phone, there are many programmers among the users, and the company allows them to contribute to new firmware versions.

9. Xiaomi plans to conquer the international market with the eight-core Redmi Note smartphone, which costs only $130. This project is being supervised by Hugo Barra, a former Google vice president in charge of the Android OS. Barra is even toying with the prospect of creating a $50 smartphone that could one day revolutionize the mobile phone economy.

10. Lei Jun is sure that most modern smartphones are overpriced by at least one and a half times. One of the main components of the markup is logistics and retail networks. According to the forecast of the founder of Xiaomi, in five years most gadgets will be sold through manufacturers’ own online stores, which will significantly affect the final price of the devices.