2023. Three things are happening to OPPO simultaneously this year, and together they define a turning point that will look significant in retrospect. The Nokia patent dispute is settling. OPPO is returning to European markets. And the Find N2 Flip is becoming the top-selling foldable in China, taking 15% of total foldable sales through the first five months of the year. Three separate story lines that are each individually significant and together describe a company that is in a stronger position at the end of 2023 than it appeared to be at the end of 2022.
The Nokia settlement and what it means
The Nokia-OPPO patent dispute ends in 2023 with a cross-licensing agreement. The specific terms are not disclosed, which is standard for these settlements. The outcome is that OPPO can sell devices in Germany and the UK again, can resume the European expansion that the injunctions interrupted, and has established a licensing relationship with Nokia that provides legal certainty for its European market operations going forward. The cost is whatever licensing fee OPPO agreed to pay, which is presumably in the range that Nokia was demanding and OPPO was rejecting — though the settlement’s non-disclosure makes it impossible to verify whether OPPO’s negotiating position improved or simply became untenable.
The European re-entry is not a triumphant return. OPPO has spent the twelve to eighteen months of its UK and Germany absence without the retail momentum, the carrier relationships, and the consumer recognition that consistent market presence builds. Samsung, Apple, and Google have not stood still. The buyers who would have purchased Find X5 successors in 2022 bought something else instead. Rebuilding that consideration set requires time and product excellence, in that order. OPPO has the product excellence. The time is the variable it cannot accelerate.
The Find N2 Flip and what it signals about OPPO’s foldable strategy
The Find N2 Flip is OPPO’s compact foldable — a clamshell design that competes with the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip4, closes to a 3.26-inch cover display, and opens to a 6.8-inch AMOLED at 120Hz. Its position as the top-selling foldable in China through May 2023, with 15% of total foldable sales in the world’s largest foldable market, is evidence that OPPO’s hardware engineering team has built something that the Chinese market values over Samsung’s equivalent. The hinge mechanism in particular is receiving consistent praise in Chinese tech reviews for its smoothness and durability relative to the Z Flip’s earlier iterations.
OPPO’s foldable strategy is further validated by the Find N3, launched in October 2023, which The Verge calls “the best foldable phone I’ve ever used” — a remarkable statement from a publication that has historically been skeptical of Chinese manufacturers’ flagship claims. The Find N3 arrives at a moment when Samsung’s Z Fold5 is the Western reference point, and it competes favorably on hinge quality, camera performance, software polish, and form factor. The gap between OPPO’s foldable engineering and Samsung’s is narrowing to a point where the primary remaining advantage Samsung holds is availability in Western markets, not hardware quality.
The ownership change nobody is talking about
A structural change in 2023 that has received almost no Western tech coverage: OPPO’s ownership transitions from BBK Electronics to Guangdong Oujia Holdings Co., Ltd. The specific nature of this restructuring — whether it represents a genuine ownership change or a corporate restructuring within the same family of interests — is not fully disclosed in public filings. What it formally means is that OPPO is no longer a BBK subsidiary in the corporate record. Whether it changes the operational relationships with Vivo, OnePlus, and Realme in ways that are visible to the market is the question that 2024 and 2025 will answer.
2023 ends with OPPO in a better position than it entered. The patent war is over. The foldables are winning. The Find N3 is getting reviews that no Chinese Android manufacturer’s flagship has earned from the Western press in years. The European comeback is underway. The ownership restructuring is opaque but not obviously negative. The story heading into 2024 is more positive than anyone watching the 2022 European exit would have predicted.
Part of OPPO: The Complete Story, my full history of OPPO from DVD players to the BBK empire.