December 2022. The OnePlus product line is now difficult to explain to someone who has not been following it. OnePlus 10 Pro, OnePlus 10T, OnePlus 10R, OnePlus Ace, OnePlus Ace Pro, OnePlus 11 arriving next month, Nord CE 3 Lite, Nord CE 3, Nord 3, Nord N30 5G, Nord N20 SE, Nord N300 5G. I have lost count of the active variants in various markets. Technology journalists are keeping spreadsheets. The community that built the brand on a single, clear value proposition (best specs, fairest price, best software) is now navigating a portfolio of devices across five price tiers with inconsistent software commitments that require research to understand.
The Ace series deserves specific attention because it is the clearest example of what OPPO rebranding under the OnePlus label looks like in practice. The OnePlus Ace, which launched in China in April 2022, is the OPPO Reno 7 Z with a different name. The OnePlus Ace Pro, launched in China in August, is the OPPO Find X5 Pro with different software. Neither device is available globally under the Ace name, which is the tell: the global OnePlus community would recognize what these products are immediately, but the Chinese market has less history with OnePlus’s independent brand narrative and is more likely to accept an OPPO product under an OPPO-adjacent name as the premium tier it is being positioned as.
The OPPO pledge and what it means
This week, OPPO has publicly committed $14 billion to “save” OnePlus: opening OPPO retail stores to OnePlus customers and OPPO service centers to OnePlus devices. The implicit acknowledgment in this pledge is striking. If OnePlus requires saving in December 2022, two years after the “closer integration” was announced as a benefit to OnePlus, the benefit has not materialized in the way that was promised. OPPO is investing its own resources to repair market position that its own corporate decisions appear to have damaged. This is not a success story dressed up as a commitment. It is a remediation plan dressed up as an announcement.
The OnePlus One was one product with one clear identity at one price point and one software promise. In December 2022, the brand is a label on a portfolio of devices that range from $179 budget Androids for T-Mobile prepaid to $969 flagship phones for buyers who want the Hasselblad branding. The community that built the brand cannot coherently advocate for all of these products simultaneously because they do not share a coherent identity. That is the SKU multiplication problem in a sentence, and it is one that a $14 billion pledge does not resolve.
Part of OnePlus: The Complete Story, my full history of OnePlus from founding to the Realme merger.