OPPO announces significant R&D investments

Tony Chen, Founder and CEO of OPPO delivers a speech at the AI session during the 2018 OPPO Technology Exhibition.

At the 2018 OPPO Technology Exhibition last month in Shenzhen.  Tony Chen, Founder, and CEO of OPPO, announced an increase in research and development (R&D) spending to about US$1.43 billion next year – a 150% year-on-year increase - and that the company would continue to increase investment on a yearly basis.

With the increased R&D capital, OPPO will integrate its supply chain and build on its technical capabilities.

Further, OPPO will leverage artificial intelligence (AI) to develop a range of smart devices, including smart watches and smart home technologies, to explore and meet the demands of consumers in the age of the Internet of Things (IoT).

As a technology company, OPPO focuses on the development of frontier technologies.

“5G is a trend OPPO must embrace. In addition to striving to become the first manufacturer to launch 5G smartphones, OPPO’s exploration of application opportunities in the 5G+ era will ultimately determine the value of 5G,” Chen stressed.

“OPPO will fully integrate 5G with applications and user insights, and continuously innovate to provide users with revolutionary, necessary, convenient and seamless experiences.”
 
OPPO established its 5G team as early as 2015 and began R&D at the onset of 5G standards. When 5G standards were frozen in December 2017, OPPO invested in the development of 5G products, enabling the interoperability of 5G signalling and data links in August 2018 before realising the first 5G smartphone connection in October 2018.
 
OPPO has applied AI technologies across applications such as photography, facial recognition and fingerprint identification while introducing new features including an AI-powered beauty camera, 3D portrait lighting and intelligent recognition scenarios.

“The benefits brought about by AI technologies will truly be realised in the 5G era. For OPPO, AI is both a capability and a mindset, and our development prospects for AI are very broad,” Chen said. By employing AI to continuously learn users’ habits, OPPO smartphones are able to proactively provide better services and more personalised experiences.
 
“In the future, smartphones will become intelligent personal assistants - and this is something OPPO will definitely enable,” Chen continued. “The smartphone is one of the best vessels for AI, but there is still considerable room for improvement. OPPO will actively embrace artificial intelligence while dedicating focus and resources to cutting-edge AI technologies and applications.”
 
Chen said that OPPO is committed to becoming a leader in an era where 5G, AI and IoT are broadly applied.

“We must dare to explore, dare to make breakthroughs and dare to innovate. In the future, OPPO will fully integrate technological innovation with art and humanity, to develop smart devices and smart homes with the smartphone at their core, and an underlying mission of continuing to meet people’s expectations for a better life,” he said.
 
OPPO has always attached great importance to R&D. Serving as a platform for internal stakeholders to exchange ideas and technology, the OPPO Technology Exhibition covered AI, big data, cloud + IoT and 5G.