After long rumors, Xiaomi officially announced its collaboration with Leica. Through this 'long-term strategic partnership', Xiaomi and Leica are jointly developing a new flagship phone that will be released in July 2022.
This news comes after rumors that the collaboration between Leica and Huawei has ended last year. Leica, a German company known for its cameras and lenses, has partnered with Huawei for the past five years.
Not much information is revealed in this announcement. It's unknown if this is an exclusive partnership, meaning no other phone will be sporting the Leica branding in the near future.
In their official statement, Xiaomi and Leica said both companies share the same idea about mobile imaging and are both excited to take mobile photography to the next level.
"Xiaomi is focused on creating the best user experience, and has always looked forward to exploring the photography capabilities of mobile phones to the extreme," said Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun, as quoted by GSM Arena, Monday (23/5/2022).
Xiaomi and Leica collaboration announcement Photo: Xiaomi
Unfortunately, Xiaomi also gave no hint about their first phone that will use a Leica camera. Most likely the phone is the Xiaomi 12 Ultra.
Not long ago, Lei Jun revealed that the latest flagship phone from Xiaomi will use the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1. Again, there is speculation that the phone that Lei Jun is referring to is the Xiaomi 12 Ultra.
Xiaomi is not the first mobile phone vendor from China to collaborate with a well-known camera brand. In addition to Huawei, Leica previously collaborated with Sharp to release phones with the Leica branding that were sold specifically in Japan.
At the end of 2020, Vivo collaborated with Zeiss and the latest collaboration between the two was the Vivo X80 series. There are also Oppo and OnePlus collaborating with Hasselblad, including the Oppo Find X5 Pro and OnePlus 10 Pro.
