Modern electric cars are said to be more like smart cell phones than traditional internal combustion cars – and soon there will be a company trying to test that theory with its own hands
NIO is a young car manufacturer from China that has become one of the most prominent under the “Tesla killer” slot in recent years, with a public offering on the New York Stock Exchange and the presentation of several models that are designed and priced as intriguing alternatives to the Model 3 and Model S popular by Elon Musk and his people. Is the next step in its development to also enter the “iPhone killer” slot? This is something that may happen during the year 2023 with a planned launch of a first smart device under the new mobile division.
According to the CEO of the company, it seems that NIO wants to focus on the premium market with the launch of one device every year, similar to Apple’s current strategy (which may indicate that it is not necessarily a single model, but a family of several variants under the same branding) – and the company’s existing experience with Snapdragon chips from Qualcomm in the built-in media systems in its vehicles lead the speculators on the network to estimate that the intended future smartphone will probably be based on the latest Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 chip, or on the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip that should succeed it towards End of the year.
Apart from that, NIO’s first smartphone should include a large curved AMOLED screen with QHD resolution, a built-in ultrasonic fingerprint scanner under the screen similar to the one found in the latest generations of Samsung’s flagship models, and support for Qualcomm’s Quick Charge 5 fast charging with up to 100 watts, which should restore the full capacity of the 4,800mAh battery in less than 25 minutes. The rest of the technical details remain vague at the moment, but there are also prophecies about a pricing that will start at a level of about 5,000 yuan in the Chinese market, or 2,390 shekels in direct conversion.
It is worth noting that NIO is not the only electric vehicle company fantasizing about storming into the mobile world – as the larger and older Geely company (whose electric Geometry C model can also be found in Israel, unlike the competitor’s vehicles which have not yet been implemented) also recently completed the takeover Smartphone maker Meizu should and may bring the brand back to stores, or alternatively use the infrastructure, knowledge and experience it now owns to create a brand new brand with a solid financial base behind it.
A significant number of well-known companies from other technological fields have also tried their luck in the smartphone market over the years, using bombastic promises, and experienced especially jarring failures that led to a rapid folding – recent examples include the Leica company, the Red Digital Cinema company and the Essential Products company of the father of the Android system . Do NIO and Geely have what it takes to succeed despite the statistics? We hope that soon we will have the opportunity to find out the answer.