While Nothing had been careful not to reveal the chip that would equip its second smartphone, a Qualcomm official botched it.
So much mystery for that? Last week at MWC 2023, Carl Pei, co-founder of Nothing, announced at the Qualcomm booth that the Nothing (2) phone will be powered by a Snapdragon 8 Series, a way of saying it will be a top-of-the-line phone, without specifying. the chip that would equip it.
There were reasons to suspect that this was not the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, the highest-end chip available, otherwise the manufacturer would not have rushed with the announcement. But given the transition from mid-range to high-end, there might also be a desire to compromise.
Timing, there will be no. A LinkedIn post by a Qualcomm official (through 91 Mobile) spoils the suspense by congratulating Carl Pei for integrating a Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 into the phone (2). The now-deleted post seems trustworthy, coming from Alex Katouzian, senior vice president and general manager of Qualcomm’s Mobile, Compute and XR (MCX) business unit.
A logical choice
If this information is confirmed, it would be a priori a good choice by Nada. By relying on a slightly older chip, the manufacturer can contain the weight of its phone while maintaining a very satisfactory level of performance. The Asus Zenfone 9, which we tested last year and which is equipped with this chip, is slightly less powerful than a OnePlus 11 with Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, but not by much.
This would allow the phone (2) to position itself right at the entry of the high-end segment. A strategy reminiscent of OnePlus’ “flagship killer”, which, let’s remember, was co-founded by Carl Pei. On the other hand, we would be very far from the initial ambitions of the company, since the phone (1) is equipped with a Snapdragon 778G + and was initially listed at 469 euros. A price that must have influenced the good results of this first model: according to the CEO of Nothing, the phone sold at least 650,000 copies
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