OnePlus 2 launch was chaos; co-founder Pei explains why

Chinese smartphone maker OnePlus was hopeful last year’s botched OnePlus1 launch would be a wake-up call on how to better handle a product launch, but sadly that didn’t happen.

For the launch of its new OnePlus 2 smartphone last week, One Plus used the invite system and promised it would be 30 to 50 times easier to get an invite this time around. On top of this, it reportedly prepared a larger product inventory this year.

The launch of OnePlus 2, however, was another big fail and One Plus president Carl Pei was again reduced to begging forgiveness for a second straight disaster.

Pei expressed regret over the failed rollout of the OnePlus 2 because of the same reasons as before: customers had a tough time getting their hands on the device and shipments failed to get to market on time.

As an act of contrition, One Plus said it plans to open up sales of OnePlus 2 to anyone by the end of this month or the start of October. It won't resort to invitations. But there's a catch to this apparent piece of good news. It’ll only be available for one hour.

Pei used the OnePlus Forum to apologize. He said the company was excited when it saw the excitement of people over OnePlus 2. Pei said he appreciates the trust and support people have given to a relatively small and unknown company like OnePlus.

Pei added that they know people are rooting for them, and want nothing more than to see them succeed. Therefore, it felt extra terrible to let their fans down this time around, again.

Explaining the supply failure, Pei said OnePlus only began shipping in ‘meaningful quantities’ nearly a month after its initial expected shipping date.

Pei said the team messed-up. In addition, he stated the company isn’t planning on making further promises for future launches.

OnePlus launched its all new OnePlus 2 smartphone in the world’s first virtual launch event. Design-wise, the metal-frame design makes it look premium. It exhibits a 5.5-inch 1080p display.

The smartphone also comes with a fingerprint scanner and USB Type-C port, as promised. The fingerprint scanner is claimed to be faster than the iPhone TouchID. It lets one save up to five fingerprints, said OnePlus.

OnePlus 2 comes with a 13-megapixel snapper up front. It also got a new camera and a new solution that allows you to take 50MP photos. OnePlus 2 also has a slow motion mode.

It’s powered by a Snapdragon 810 processor coupled with 4GB of RAM. It houses a 3,300mAh battery.

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