If you’ve been waiting for the launch of the OnePlus 2 and are starting to grow impatient, you’re not alone. Even OnePlus’ founder Carl Pei has seemingly grown tired of the delays and has taken to the OnePlus forums to apologise for the delays in getting the distribution of their new phone up to speed.
We messed up the launch of the OnePlus 2.
Well, we messed up the launch of the OnePlus One as well. Although inventory levels ramped up eventually, months after the announcement, it was still extremely difficult to buy the device. We comforted ourselves to the fact that we were young, and that we’d learn and show the world we could do better next time around.
With the OnePlus 2, we made rosy plans. We were more confident, and prepared a lot more inventory. We told our users it would be 30-50x easier to get invites, and they needn’t worry. Yet, we only began shipping in meaningful quantities this week, nearly a month after our initial targeted shipping date. You can talk all you want, but in the end, flawless execution speaks much louder than unfulfilled promises.
I’d like to apologize on behalf of OnePlus for the delay.
On the surface, the launch of the OnePlus 2 seems to be smoother than the original OnePlus One, but its still far from that rosy outcome. The invite system remains a barrier to actually getting your hands on a device, and it appears that people are already feeling hard done by with it – not to mention others finding ways to game it.
Carl also wrote in August about slowed invitation rollouts, mainly due to improvements to Oxygen OS and QC issues with their USB-C cables.
Today’s update mentions the possibility of opening up the device to direct sales (no invite required) for an hour sometime in the next month. If that happens, we’ll keep you posted on it.
Wow, who would have thought this would happen again? /s
2016 flagship killer indeed. *snort*
Carl, it’s easy to launch a phone, especially as you have a very good idea of the demand. What you do is go to your parent company (OPPO), ask them to manufacture 100 000 phones. When that’s rolling and you have an inventory of say half that amount – you open sales to buy or pre-order if you run out. Then you place an order of another 100 000 phones with OPPO to be delivered in stages over the next few months, and so on.
I’m thankful for the delays. It stopped me from making a terrible mistake in getting it. I must admit, the temptation after getting an invite was strong because the camera is quite good on the OP2, but there are too many “buts” in the process, not least the hoops you have to jump through just to get it delivered to Australia.
Did anyone check if his fingers were crossed while typing this?