The soil is still fertile enough for it to take root an operation similar to the one that led to the climb of the first OnePlus? There were two helmsmen at the time: Pete Lau, who is still in the control room and is probably one of the key personalities in the merger with Oppo, and Carl Pei who left OnePlus when he sensed that things would change radically shortly thereafter, and that the company would have little to do with what the start-up had been and had represented up to that point. moment.
Convinced that the challenges of technology had to be faced in a certain way, Carl Pei rolled up his sleeves by starting a new path, the his and to her manner, as a single helmsman. He founded Nothing and with hindsight we could say that the Ear (1) earphones were a tool with which to test the ground to verify the feasibility of what may have been his goal from the start, return to the smartphone market by resuming that narrative that in OnePlus was interrupted abruptly and due to force majeure. And in the interview granted to colleagues of wallpaper.com the philosophy of the first OnePlus and Pei, that perhaps I am they were synonymous, it emerges clearly.
GIVE VALUE TO THE INTERNAL COMPONENTS, AND DO IT WITH STYLE
Some of the sketches that led to the final design of Nothing Phone (1)
The CEO of Nothing and the contact person for the Phone (1) project Tom Howard not surprisingly, they seem to share the way they see and approach challenges. It is immediately understood, at the first answer: “Looking inside almost all Android phones you realize they are exactly identical“, an anticipation of the fact that Pei and Howard have approached the Nothing smartphone project by questioning any established practice, even one that normally leads to ignoring the opportunities for differentiation granted by the internal components.
And that instead Nothing Phone (1) will try not only to make visible, but also to enhance.
From a design point of view, we wanted to make the invisible visible, and this meant collaborating with the engineers to start from the base plant. A smartphone is made up of more than 400 components: we wanted to highlight “the good ones”, the ones we thought were interesting to highlight.
Between “the good ones” for Howard there are for example the cameras and the coil for wireless charging, but Nothing had in mind to make them simply visible through a transparent back – an operation however rather rare, remember Xiaomi Mi 9 Explorer Edition, the predecessor, and a few others examples – but, in fact, of find a way to enhance themthe. So it was necessary to rethink the production process to succeed in coherence with the company philosophy.
A detail of the New York subway map that inspired Nothing
It wasn’t easy, so much so that Howard confesses that it resulted from it “a puzzle”. To put the pieces together we were inspired by one of the most iconic schemeslike the 1972 New York subway map by Massimo Vignelli and Bob Noorda.
He played a central role in organizing a very, very complex system, as well as figuring out how to illustrate everything beautifully. But we didn’t stop at the map of New York, we also examined many others (such as The Tube in London, the metropolis where Nothing is headquartered? Ed).
NOTHING LIKE APPLE: IDENTITY, FIRST OF ALL
After Howard it was the turn of Carl Pei reveal the background of the project that will see the light in summer. Which he hasn’t denied (he never did, to tell the truth) of draw inspiration from Apple, considered an example:
One of the problems of the tech industry is that no one has a consistent way of designing products. Apart from Apple, whose consistency is there for all to see. But putting the products of any other manufacturer on a table, you immediately realize that there is no consistency. From the very beginning of the adventure we had in mind to have a distinct and iconic stylistic language. Phone (1) and Ear (1) will clearly belong to the same family, and as we complete our product portfolio we will maintain our identity.
On the topic of sustainability neither Howard nor Pei have unbuttoned, net of the fact that Phone (1) will have a recycled aluminum frame, so as to reduce the carbon footprint. But it is unlikely that the smartphone will not be interesting also in this respect, which Nothing has already shown to care with the Ear (1). Below is the most recent overview provided by the rumors about the possible specifications of Nothing Phone (1).
NOTHING PHONE (1), THE CARDINES FOR THE NOISE
- display: AMOLED 6.43 “FHD +, 90 Hz refresh rate, HDR10 +
- chip: Qualcomm Snapdragon 778G
- memories:
- 8 GB of RAM
- 128GB of storage
- connectivity: 5G
- user interface: Nothing OS based on Android 12
- cameras:
- front: 32 MP
- rear:
- 50 MP main
- 8 MP (ultra wide?)
- 2 MP (macro or depth?)
- drums: 4,500 mAh with wireless charging
