After a little over twenty years of existence and twelve years in the world of smartphones, the Chinese brand Meizu is bowing out and announces that it is leaving the mobile sector. Its initial activity, focused on MP3 players from 2003, quickly moved towards smartphones, presenting a first device reminiscent of the iPhone from 2007, then towards Android smartphones From 2011, with the launch of its first terminal under Google OS, the M9. In 2023, the Chinese firm announced its M20 series and its 21 model, which will therefore be its last devices.
The vice-president of Meizu, Li Nan, announced on February 18, on the social network Weibo, the change in activity of the brand. Putting an end to the development of smartphones, it will focus in the future on the extremely trendy world of artificial intelligence. Li Nan judges for his part “obviously gimmicky” THE “brands that create AI for smartphones” to date, and therefore intends to present more convincing solutions. According to the Chinese press, it involves creating a new mobile operating system tailored for artificial intelligence – which we imagine to be derived from its current FlymeOS —, and relying on international language models, like Open AI. The brand also intends to create products using AI, with initial results which should be available by the end of 2024. Meizu is giving itself three years to become number one in the still fairly nebulous field of “AI Devices” as part of its “All in AI” strategy.
Although it is radical, Meizu’s choice hardly surprises. The brand, present in Europe in the 2010s, officially stopped distributing its smartphones in France in 2018; According to The China Project, the brand had sold less than 500,000 products in 2021, accounting for 0.1% of sales on its domestic market. It was also acquired in 2022 by Xingji Technology, a company launched by Eric Li, the founder of the vehicle manufacturer Geely, which was already shaping its future in the field of systems. ¨my on-board automobiles.