Xiaomi: From a garage in Beijing to global leadership

From idea to implementation: how Xiaomi was born

Xiaomi is now associated with innovative smartphones, smart tech and aggressive pricing. But few know that its story began in a modest office of just 20 square meters in one of Beijing’s business centers. Founder Lei Jun and his team of seven engineers set an ambitious goal in 2010: to create a smartphone that combines flagship specs and an affordable price. The idea seemed utopian — until the Mi 1, the brand’s first phone, came to market.

Interestingly, Xiaomi's name translates from Chinese as "millet," a cereal that in China is traditionally associated with small but healthy crops, a metaphor that perfectly reflected the company's philosophy of making small but meaningful strides in technology. The initial investment in the project was only $40 million -- a ridiculous amount by the standards of modern tech giants, but enough to get started.

It’s important to understand that Xiaomi didn’t just copy Western brands; Lei Jun’s team initially relied on direct sales over the Internet, bypassing intermediaries, and on close interaction with users through forums and social networks; this approach reduced marketing and logistics costs by reallocating funds to improve products. Within a year of founding, Xiaomi became one of the most talked about companies in the Chinese Internet segment.

Geography of the creation: why Beijing?

The capital of China was chosen by Xiaomi’s founders for a reason: Beijing in the 2010s became the country’s main technology hub, home to talented engineers, venture capital funds and manufacturing facilities, and home to the headquarters of giants such as Baidu, Lenovo and Sina, creating a welcoming ecosystem for startups.

Xiaomi’s first office was in Haidian, China’s Silicon Valley counterpart, and it was here that Ley Jun rented a small space in the TusPark business center (known as “Stanford China”), interestingly, Qualcomm and Intel’s labs were located nearby, making it easier to negotiate chipsets for future smartphones.

• 📍 First office address: TusPark, Haidian District, Beijing (whale. )
• 🏢 Room area: 20 m2 (at the start), later expanded to 200 m²
• 👥 First team: 7 people (6 engineers) + Lei Jun)
• 💰 Start-up capital: $40 million from venture capital funds Qiming Venture and IDG Capital

Beijing’s key advantage was its proximity to manufacturing clusters in Shenzhen and Dongguan, where Xiaomi later built devices, and the capital’s logistics infrastructure to quickly deliver components and finished devices across the country, and Beijing gave access to government support, with Chinese authorities heavily subsidizing high-tech startups in the 2010s.

Who was at the origins: the team of founders

Xiaomi’s success was largely determined by the people assembled by Lei Jun, who by 2010 had a reputation as “China’s Steve Jobs”: he spent 16 years at Kingsoft (China’s Microsoft equivalent), launching the company on an IPO, and was known as one of the country’s top managers, but it required a different profile to build smartphones.

The first team included:

• 🔧 Lin Binh, former vice president of Google China, was responsible for developing the Android platform for Xiaomi (later became president of the company).
• 📱 Li Wangqiang is a hardware expert who previously worked at Motorola and Kingsoft.
• 🎨 Hun Feng is an interface designer who came from Microsoft Research Asia.
• 💻 Zhang Guangjie, Cloud Services Specialist, Creator of Xiaomi Cloud.

Lei Jun called his team the “samurai family,” a reference to a classic Japanese film, each with experience in multinational corporations, but decided to take the risk and join a startup. For example, Lin Binh refused a position in Google for Xiaomi, although his annual salary there exceeded the previous year. $This move was later called one of the riskiest in China. IT-industry.

⚠️ Attention: Many sources mistakenly attribute the creation of Xiaomi to Lei Jun. In fact, without a team of engineers from Google, Motorola and Microsoft, the project would not have taken place.

The first product: how to create Xiaomi Mi 1

Xiaomi Mi 1 was announced in August 2011, but work on it had begun long before that, with the team spending 14 months developing, testing and refining the device, and the main problem was the lack of hardware experience: Xiaomi had to work with outside contractors like Foxconn and Inventec.

The technical characteristics of the Mi 1 were striking for its time:

The feature of the Mi 1 was the firmware MIUI — A customized version of Android with unique design and features that competitors didn't have. MIUI appeared:

• 🎨 Design themes – the ability to completely change the interface of the smartphone.
• 🔒 Built-in antivirus is rare for Android in 2011.
• 📱 One-Hand Optimization – Simplified Control of Large Screens.

The first batch of 300,000 Mi 1s sold out in 34 hours, a record for the Chinese market, with demand exceeding supply by 10 times, forcing Xiaomi to rethink logistics, and the company began using the flash-sale model, which later became the brand’s hallmark.

Flagship processor for half the price of competitors |

MIUI with unique features |

Direct sales via the Internet without intermediaries |

Active interaction with users on forums |

Limited sales (flash-sale) to create excitement-->

Manufacturing and partners: who helped Xiaomi at the start

Although Xiaomi was a “Internet company,” it needed reliable manufacturing capacity, and the first smartphones were built in factories.

• 🏭 Foxconn (Taiwan) is the main assembly partner for the Mi 1 and Mi 2, and it was here that the iPhone and iPad were later released.
• 🏗️ Inventec (China) – responsible for logistics and parts of production lines.
• 🔧 BYD Electronic (Shenzhen) - supplied batteries and some components.

Interestingly, Xiaomi did not have its own factories until 2016, when it used the OEM/ODM (original equipment manufacturer) model, where production is delegated to third-party companies under its own brand, saving on infrastructure and focusing on development and marketing.

The key suppliers of components are:

• 📱 Qualcomm – Snapdragon processors for the first smartphones.
• 🖥️ Samsung — AMOLED-flash-screen.
• 📷 Sony – camera matrices (starting with Mi) 2S).

⚠️ Attention: Many analysts criticized Xiaomi for not having its own factories in 2011-2012, calling it “just a reseller,” but this strategy avoided the risks of underutilization and focused on innovation.

By 2013, Xiaomi had already partnered with more than 200 suppliers around the world, but the main production chains remained in China, which gave an advantage in the speed of release of new models: if Samsung or Apple spent 12-18 months developing a smartphone, Xiaomi coped with it in 6-9 months.

Brand Evolution: From Startup to Global Player

After the success of the Mi 1 Xiaomi has started to expand rapidly. 2012 The company released the Mi 2 Snapdragon-powered S4 Pro and screen 4.3" 1280×720, and the first Mi TV set. TV — step into the smart tech segment. 2014 Xiaomi has entered the top-3 Smartphone manufacturers in the world, ahead of Lenovo and LG.

The company’s geography has also expanded:

• 🌏 2013 – entering the markets of Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore.
• 🌍 2014 – the beginning of sales in India (today it is the largest market of Xiaomi).
• 🌎 2015 – Expansion to Europe (Spain, France) and Brazil.

Today, Xiaomi is not only smartphones, but also:

• 📺 Smart TVs (Mi series) TV redmi TV).
• 💡 Smart home (Yeelight lamps, Mi Robot vacuum cleaners).
• 🎧 Audio (Mi AirDots headphones, Mi Speaker speakers).
• 🚲 Electric transport (electrical amokata Mi Electric Scooter).

In 2021, Xiaomi ranked 2nd in the world in smartphone shipments (after Samsung), overtaking Apple. and in 2023, the company unveiled its first electric car Xiaomi SU7, confirming its ambition to become "China's Apple" with a full ecosystem approach.

Myths and Reality: What’s Wrong with Xiaomi

There are many myths surrounding the creation of Xiaomi.

1. “Xiaomi is a Chinese clone of Apple” Reality: Yes, Ley Jun was inspired by Jobs, but Xiaomi’s business model was radically different. Apple was betting on premiums and high margins, Xiaomi was betting on accessibility and direct sales. Besides, MIUI always had unique features that were not available in iOS.
2. Reality: There's no evidence that the team worked in a garage. The first office at TusPark was a modest, but still a business center, not a garage. This myth was similar to the story of HP or Apple.
3. Reality: In 2011-2014, accusations of copying did ring (for example, the Mi 2 looked like the iPhone 4S).However, later Xiaomi developed its own design language, especially in the Mi Mix and Mi 11 series.

Another common stereotype is that Xiaomi hacked the market only because of cheap labor, and in fact, the main factor of success was:

• 📉 Supply Chain Optimization (direct contracts with Qualcomm, Samsung).
• 💻 Minimum marketing costs (viral growth through forums).
• 🔄 Fast update cycle (new models every 6 months).

💡

If you see a Xiaomi smartphone with a suspiciously low price (like a $50 Redmi Note), chances are it's a fake.The official devices are sold through mi.com, the AliExpress Official Store or authorized retailers.

FAQ: answers to frequent questions about the creation of Xiaomi