Meizu, the Chinese smartphone maker, disclosed today that the company had raised more than RMB2 billion (more than US$300 million) at a valuation of more than RMB20 billion (more than US$3 billion).
The very first round of funding had been closed by the end of the June, according to the company, which began in early this year, although for years the founder of the company, Huang Zhang (aka J.W.) rejected the idea.
The company disclosed it today must have something to do with that Xiaomi, whom Meizu founder publicly hates, launched its latest flagship phone today. Meizu Mr. Huang accused Xiaomi stealing its business secrets. Though it’s unknown to what extent Mr. Huang’s story was accurate or objective, Xiaomi’s way of doing the Android phone business, from hardware design to custom operating system development, was similar to Meizu’s.
Meizu and Xiaomi would launch their third-gen Android phones in September 2013. While Xiaomi has launched its flagship phone and a fitness band, Meizu said today that the company would launch four 4G phones, both high-end and low-end, in the second half of this year.
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