Carl Pei: Journey from OnePlus to Nothing Smartphone Brand

Carl Pei transformed his passion for gadgets into a successful smartphone brand, achieving $600 million in annual revenue within two years.

### Building a Smartphone Company: From Early Inspiration to $600M in Revenue
* 📱 Carl Pei, founder of [Music] Nothing, shares his journey from being an **early Apple product enthusiast** to founding a **smartphone company**.
* 🇨🇳 After working in China for 11 years, including at OnePlus, Pei decided to start his own company, **Nothing**, in 2020.
* 💡 Facing challenges in raising funds and securing manufacturing partnerships, Nothing pivoted to start with **earbuds** before moving to **smartphones**.
* 🎧 The launch of the earbuds faced a major setback with **90% of the initial batch experiencing charging issues**, but the team quickly **rectified the problem**.
* 💼 Pei emphasizes the importance of balancing design and functionality in hardware startups, suggesting a **90% Tim Cook, 10% Jony Ive approach**.
* 💬 The Glyph interface on Nothing's smartphone aims to **promote mindful smartphone use** by displaying **key information** on the back of the device.
* 🚀 Nothing has achieved **$600 million in annualized revenue**, targeting a niche market of **tech enthusiasts and creatives**.
* 🌟 Pei encourages aspiring hardware startup founders to focus on **building credibility step by step** and find satisfaction in **seeing people use their products in the real world**.

today on the main function, we're hanging out with Carl Pay, the founder of [Music] Nothing. He built a smartphone company that launched two years ago, and in those two years, they've gotten to $600 million in annualized revenue. So, we're going to talk about that and a whole lot more. Let's get started. So, why don't we start right at the top? For someone who runs a smartphone company, you're really young, actually. What was your journey into tech and into making smartphones specifically? I was a big gadget fan when I was a kid. I think I was probably one of the first people in Sweden to have the iPod, and I was definitely the first among my friends to get the iPhone. Back then, the iPhone was a US exclusive with AT&T, and I had to get a US friend to buy it from me and pay a cancellation fee to AT&T, ship it to me. I had to like jailbreak it to be able to use it. How old were you when you first held the iPhone 1? The first iPhone was probably 18.

maybe 18, and you know those early Apple products were super inspiring for me. Unfortunately, the iPod that I got broke just a week after the warranty ended. I was very young at that time, so I couldn't really afford another iPod, and I got kind of pissed off because like after one year, and it broke. So one time when I was visiting relatives in China, we went to the electronics market, and we bought an MP3 player from a brand called Mesu. I'm like wow, this is really cool. Like I didn't know China could produce good quality electronics. So I got that. The sound quality was great, the design was beautiful, and I created a fan community around this brand. We were profiled a couple of years later in the Los Angeles Times, and then the company was really happy because there was this kid in Sweden doing like being their spokesperson. And so they recruited me after uni through the magic of the internet. Through the magic of the internet. I was actually thinking about applying to YC at that

time uh so I was like weighing okay do I have to back then it was all about consumer internet right like it was a Facebook Hera and I was like should I write a pitch for YC or should I take this offer in China to be a part of the beginning of the smartphone kind of industry there to be honest I was just too lazy to write the write the pitch W there's only 12 questions uh so I took the offer that I had and I I flew to China in 2011 and stayed there for 11 years that's where I learned how to make Hardware so how did you get in touch with OnePlus and you started off I mean from your this experience of creating a brand and creating a community um it it trans it translated very directly I I went to this company and I love their products but their founder was kind of depressed because um their competitors were doing better than them so for the year I was there he never showed up to work he was still working like doing

some UI design at home, but he never showed up to the company, so I lost a lot of respect, if I'm honest. Like, I'm like, this guy is probably not going to make it if he can't handle setbacks. So, I started looking and talking to other companies, and back then, Oppo wasn't another company that I reached out to since I was already in the region. So, I got recruited into Oppo, but then quickly I heard that they wanted to create a new brand to target the online market because Oppo is very offline, offline distribution, offline sales channels. I owned one of their DVD player/ karaoke machines before, very cool. Yeah, there were new companies selling products online that were really disrupting via D2C. So, that was the original vision for OnePlus: like, how can we take the Oppo supply chain advantages, huge scale, low cost, good quality, and sell products online and be really disruptive. And initially, they were really focused on China. They built a management team around China, and I was like a 24-year-old.

kid. So, I was like, Hey, I don't want to do this old thing anymore. I want to do this new thing, and don't worry about China. I'll take care of everything outside of China. You don't have any team for that anyway. And they were like, Yeah, okay, whatever. We're going to be focused on the China market. Was it Android already by then, or was it other OS's? It was Android-based. And the way it works is Google does not have their services in China, so there was no Android build for my markets outside of China. And I don't know if you remember, at that time, there was a company called Cogen. They started off as a community thing, like a custom ROM that got to millions of users. Yeah, yeah. And they had just become a company at that time. They were sort of like a Linux skin back in the day, right? And then, you know, obviously, Android is a variant of Linux, so yeah, it was based on... They were able to translate that very quickly. We

found a lot of users online, and they had just raised money, and they became a real company instead of this community thing. And I'm like, Hey, we're starting something new, you're starting something new, so why don't we collaborate? Um, so that's how we solved the problem of not having our own operating system for my international markets back then. You stayed at OnePlus through 2021, was it? Through 2020, and then, uh, did you know that you were going to start nothing, or you know, on day one, or did you have a moment in there where you're trying to figure out what the next thing would be? Yeah, for the longest time, I thought I was going to travel the world for half a year at least because at OnePlus, I was so busy. I was working at least six days a week and just no real vacations for seven years. But after ten days on that holiday, it got kind of boring. I felt like I was burning away my life, and I was still young, and I was

staying in a fancy hotel and enjoying the drinks and the dinners and whatnot, but I felt a lot of anxiety that I wasn't contributing anything. So, I quickly wrapped up the trip after 10 days, went back to Stockholm where I grew up, and started reaching out to entrepreneurs there. Because I had never raised money before, I started reaching out to all the entrepreneurs I knew, and they kept introducing me to people. So basically, in like 3 weeks in Sweden, I got coached by all the Swedish entrepreneurs on how to raise money. It was a super welcoming community. I'm sure it's the same here. I haven't spent as much time here. That's the coolest thing about working with founders is that everyone sort of recognizes how hard it is, and then, you know, we're the ones who can help make it easier for each other. Yeah, um, and it was really confusing at the time because everybody was giving me slightly different advice. Oh yeah, well, everyone has like n equals one like what I

experienced. There's all these concepts like how do they, how did they fit together, um, but eventually it clicked and, uh, uh, we quickly raised the seed round. At that time, what was the first thing that you wanted to do? I mean, one of the trickier things about smartphones is that unlike software, you can't sit in, uh, a garage in front of, you know, two or three people in front of a computer and just like get a splashy launch out there like this is. It's hardware, it's relationships, there's a whole value chain here, right? Yeah, I think in the beginning, um, the idea wasn't super clear. I'm super ashamed of my, uh, seed deck. It's really, really bad. Um, I think basically I just wanted to take all the learnings I had from OnePlus and do it better. That's how it started, but now over time, the idea has, has changed a lot. Um, so I guess at that stage, I just, I just wanted to raise some money. Um, we knew that it would be impossible to

raise enough money to make a smartphone. We made a quick calculation at that time. I think we said we need at least 100 million USD to make a phone, and I think, you know, there's no way to raise 100 million for me, at least in the seed stage. We also got shunned by a lot of the factories that made phones, like Foxconn, for instance. Foxconn at that time had worked with like five startups that made phones, and all those five startups had failed. And they're like, Hey, we're not going to work with any more startups. We're just going to do our Apple thing and whatever and just make a little bit of money. No more startups. So Foxconn, as a contract manufacturer, is one of the key players that you need to go and get a contract with, 'cause they're the ones who take all the components and integrate it and test it for you. And they make iPhones as well, so they're very happy with their Apple relationship. And there was a period of time where they took on a lot of risk with working with startups.

but when it came to our turn, that wasn't the case anymore. What's the game theory there? I mean, Foxconn. Normally, you'd think that they would really want more competition for Apple because the problem that we see in startups all the time, it's happened to YC companies all the time, is single-channel risk. If you have one big buyer and they have 100% of your business, then guess who owns who, right? So why isn't Foxconn worried about this? They're worried. So that's why they tried working with countless startups, but they all failed, and they lost money each time because they have opportunity costs. They have to invest in engineering and even inventory. Actually, I heard they used to. This is pretty crazy. Now it doesn't happen anymore, but the factory, I mean, the Foxconn and their competitors, they took on the inventory risk for the startups as well. So when the startups made a big projection in terms of the unit sales and they couldn't deliver, they were fine. Yeah, Foxconn was stuck.

with inventory. I mean, that's a lot of nuance there, right? In order to create a value chain, like to actually create the supply chain, it's actually different companies that have to collaborate, trust each other, and take risks with one another. Actually, yeah. It was very hard, in honest. I felt like when it came our turn, the game had become a lot harder because of what happened in the past. So, that's why we decided to make earbuds first. We're like, Okay, nobody's going to trust us. I'm making a phone. Let's make something smaller but equally complicated. Not equally, but still quite complicated 'cause there's antennas and Bluetooth and radio and stuff like that, and battery. And let's just sell a ton of them, like we sell a ton of them, and then the factories are going to want to work with us. However, when we started making earbuds, nobody wanted to take our business either 'cause they were like, Hey, there's a thousand companies making earbuds. What makes you special? Who are

you just because you worked at a larger company in the past doesn't mean you're going to be able to context switch and make an earbud startup successfully. So, the only factory that wanted to work with us was a factory that had no other clients. Like, without us, they would go bankrupt. That's the only reason they took Underdog. Plus, Underdog, yeah, but it was a disaster. We do the engineering of the product, we do the design engineering, and we also designed the manufacturing line for each product. And then the factory just has to replicate our design, like each station, what is the task. And um, that factory couldn't replicate our process. So, that in the end, the Pogo pin, the metallic part of the case that connects to the metallic part of the earbuds that charges it, the spring wasn't strong enough. Oh man, so for the first batch of ear ons, um, 90% of them couldn't charge properly. Oh no, and at that time, I think we had shipped like 5,000 units, and we started

getting a lot of feedback through our customer support channels, and we're like, Oh my God, this is like game over. So, that must have been a scary moment, right? So, you raised your seed, you have this grand vision and plan that, you know, We do this, and then we get to do the smartphone. Yeah, and then out of the gate, you ship 5,000, and 90% of them are coming back as returns. Yeah, so we were super friendly with our customers. We just shipped them new devices, and we immediately stopped the production. We immediately rented out two apartments just outside of the factory, and we put 15 engineers in those apartments. And basically, our engineers, de facto, became the factory floor managers, just overseeing that every part of the factory was manufacturing to our spec. And then we got the quality up. Oh, nice. So, we ended up selling about 600,000 units for year one. So, you saved it. We saved it, but it was very, very uncomfortable.

scary at that time. Yeah, what caused you to sort of roll up your sleeves right at that moment? Was it just a either we do this or we die? Like, you know, some people who obviously can't make Hardware, they just sort of throw their hands up and they say, Well, I guess that's it. There's a beauty to not having another option; it forces you to survive. Um, I've seen that multiple times in our journey, like, and each time we come out a little bit stronger, better processes, or better teams, or better partners. I think it's that; it's like the desire to keep on living as a company in terms of, like, nothing users or nothing sort of your stalwart customers. Um, there's a sense of, like, If you know, you know. Um, what does that mean? Like, how did you cultivate that? I think it simply just means that our brand awareness is too low, I'm honest. Um, well, I mean, I guess you could argue that it's, uh, like a growing cult brand, you know, 600 mil a

year in revenue is actually quite a lot, you know, in terms of how big a company might be. But on the other hand, like, it's not, you know, a large majority of the smartphone market by any stretch. Yet I feel this time is different. This time around, our current users are partially tech enthusiasts and partially kind of creatives, people who like design, who like fashion and music. And we didn't have that community before. So I think because we've been a lot more design-centric this time around with nothing, it's really helped us attract a different type of crowd. Our Instagram feed is very curated, kind of like a hybrid between a luxury fashion brand and a tech brand. The visuals have really attracted a different type of user. So if you had to guess or give advice to people who are trying to make a hardware startup, what percentage should they be Tim Cook versus Johnny Ive? I think for most people, they should be 90% Tim Cook, if I'm honest, because survival is the name of

the game for Hardware only when you survive, and you pick up in volumes. You pick up in when you pick up in volumes. You can get stronger engineering teams, or you get lower prices. Like, it's so... This industry is so volume-driven. Um, so I think in the beginning, you should be like Tim Cook. Over time, you can become more like Johnny Ive. Um, or you should be more like Johnny Ive over time as you create more differentiation in the product. It's not something people want to hear, I think, but I think it's the truth. Is there a max amount of Johnny Ive you should be? Uh, yeah, maybe it's like 20%. Yeah, 80% be safe. Yeah, 20% take a risk, and you can increase the threshold 20% to something higher over time. So, let's talk about the glyph interface in the context of sort of this Tim Cook versus Johnny Ive thing. Uh, it seems like a really good example of 90% Tim Cook, 10% Johnny Ive. You might have heard of Yesper, the founder of Teenage.

engineering. He's one of my legends, yeah. He's one of my partners in this company, and I learned this one thing from him. It's basically for every product you make, um, imagine if a user sees it for like two seconds and then has to sketch a defining feature of the product. So, we try and build each product with, uh, something iconic that people can immediately remember and attach themselves to. Uh, that was like the thinking behind the cliff interface. On a product functionality level, we have this thought that, you know, um, when Steve Jobs pitched a personal computer, it was pitched as the bicycle for the mind. It enabled us to do way more stuff creatively. However, the modern smartphone is just so far away from that idea. It's making us more addicted. It's making us sad. Uh, it's making us watch garbage content on TikTok. So, how can we make people more mindful about their smartphone use message? And we wanted to allow people to flip the phone over and just through lights on the back of the phone know all

the important things that are happening so they don't have to always check the screen or turn on the screen because once you turn on the screen and unlock it just want to do the next thing and just want to scroll a little bit on your Twitter feed or whatever so we would have useful things like being able to set different patterns for different people so you know who's trying to contact you or we we've done Integrations with Google Calendar and Uber so in Uber's case you can see how far the Uber is without turning over your phone it's like a countdown with the lights Google Calendar you can see how much time there is to to your next meeting so just things that keep you away from kind of Doom scrolling okay we're going to do a uh a segment around design so from purely from a design perspective uh tell me your favorite sneaker this is a hard question because I I've changed um I used to collect sneakers all the like collabs and stuff but lately I've just been wearing kind of Classics classic uh

White um common projects common projects yeah yeah what's your favorite Apple product um this might sound a bit strange but it's the volume knob UI on the first gen iPad when it was still skoric um that's the moment I fell in love with apple like that's such a small detail right on the on the original iPad if you swiped up you got this kind of control p panel thing with the volume knob on the left side and it was it was like brushed metal and as you tilted the iPad the gyroscope recognized it got tilted so the the light reflection on the brush metal also changed I I was like wow if Apple cares about such a minute detail in the product I'll trust them completely because they've really thought through everything else we need to bring ski morphism back I hate flat design personally yeah same here it's very unpopular opinion people love flat design but I'm not a fan so bring me back what's your favorite watch uh you know it's probably my Royal Oak nice classic yeah I'm not a super

big Smartwatch fan, if I'm honest. Yeah, like I get a ton of notifications on my phone and just having another machine to keep beeping. I was not a fan of that. Yeah, kind of a nightmare. Yeah, best sci-fi movie aesthetic. Aesthetic. Yeah, Space Odyssey. Yeah, a lot of our brand. We have a lot of like Space Odyssey screenshots on our mood board for the brand. It's so cool. I'm super into Blade Runner. So it's. Yeah, 2049. I don't know anything. Both like the original and the Denny Villeneuve remake. Just pretty amazing. Yeah, that's pretty cool too. We also have screenshots from Blade Runner. Oh yeah, definitely. Carl, thanks a lot for hanging out with us today. I really enjoyed this conversation and you built something of great value that you know in some ways you've been through many ego deaths and then in other ways you're. I can see the trajectory on this and you just getting start. I think. Yeah, yeah. Do you have any last words for now? You know, to leave our audience. You know, a lot of people.

who are watching might want to start hardware startups. Um, you know, you've created one of the hardest ones to do, which is in the smartphone category. What do you have to tell them? Yeah, I think there's no beating around the bush. It's going to be tough, but it's doable if you want to do it. I think you should go ahead, but maybe think about the sequencing of things. Um, like in our example, like we had to get the earbuds to sell really well before going into the phone. Um, like how can we build credibility to the next thing? And I think some people watching this might be a little bit confused to like as to why do it at all when there's other things you can be doing, and this sounds really hard. But I would just like to say that there is a lot of satisfaction in seeing people in the real world using a product that you've helped build, especially if they don't recognize you. If they don't recognize you as the maker of the product, that means your brand is growing.

in brand awareness, and you're reaching new people. I think that feeling is just so different compared to if you're making an app or some server-side infra. Well, thanks for working on it, and if anything, I'm kind of surprised that there aren't more, you know. I think it's a testament to how hard it is to create what you've created, so thanks for joining us. Thank you for having me, and hopefully, hope somebody watching this will create the next one, you know it. [Music]

How Nothing Founder Carl Pei Built A Multi-Million Dollar Smartphone Brand In Just 2 Years

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Y Combinator

Carl Pay, the founder of Nothing, has rapidly grown his smartphone company to $600 million in annualized revenue within two years.

His passion for gadgets began in childhood, leading him to unique experiences with Apple's products and ultimately to China, where he spent 11 years learning about hardware.

Pay's journey included stints with OnePlus and Oppo, where he played a key role in disrupting the smartphone market through direct-to-consumer sales.

Transitioning from OnePlus to Starting Nothing

The speaker wanted to shift focus from the old to a new venture, taking charge of markets outside of China.

They collaborated with Cogen, a company that started as a community custom ROM, to address the lack of an operating system for international markets.

After leaving OnePlus, the speaker struggled with the idea of their next move but eventually raised a seed round and aimed to apply their learnings from OnePlus to their new venture.

Struggles of Starting a Smartphone and Earbud Company

Raising $100 million for a smartphone was challenging, and the founder faced rejection from key manufacturers like Foxconn.

The factory's previous experiences with failed startups made them hesitant to take on new clients.

To build trust and gain factory support, the founder shifted focus to making earbuds, but faced difficulties in finding a willing manufacturer and replicating the production process, leading to a high failure rate in the first batch.

Overcoming Early Challenges in Hardware Startup

The founder faced a major setback with 90% of their initial smartphone shipments being returned, leading to a halt in production and a hands-on approach from engineers.

Despite the rocky start, they managed to sell 600,000 units in the first year by improving quality and cultivating a design-centric brand image.

The founder emphasizes the importance of prioritizing survival and volume in the early stages of a hardware startup, suggesting a balance of 80% focus on stability and 20% on taking risks for differentiation.

The speaker's partner emphasizes creating iconic product features for easy user recall.

They aim to make smartphone use more mindful by using lights on the back of the phone to convey important notifications.

The speaker's favorite design elements include the volume knob UI on the first-gen iPad and classic sneakers, while expressing a desire to bring back skeuomorphism in design.

Building a Hardware Startup: Insights from a Smartwatch Fan

The speaker is a big fan of smartwatches but initially found them overwhelming with notifications.

They draw inspiration from sci-fi movies like Space Odyssey and Blade Runner for their brand's aesthetic.

The speaker emphasizes the challenges of starting a hardware startup, particularly in the smartphone category, and advises building credibility through successful product launches.