Xiaomi rollouts target big spenders

Staff reporter

Xiaomi (1810) will on Thursday launch a new premium smartphone and luxury electric vehicle as well as its first artificial intelligence-powered laptop as part of a move toward the high-end market.

Chairman Lei Jun said the Xiaomi 15 Ultra smartphone and the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra EV are the company's most sophisticated offerings in its 15-year history and that the Ultras will usher in "a new era for the brand."

Earlier, Xiaomi had announced that the pre-order price for the SU7 Ultra would be 814,900 yuan (HK$874,295), nearly three times the 215,900 yuan that a Xiaomi SU7 standard version costs.

On Sunday, Xiaomi's partner and president of the smartphone department Lu Weibing wrote in a post that one goal of the company's premiumization strategy is to scale up sales of products priced above 6,000 yuan, with the help of Ultra products.

The AI-enabled Redmi Book Pro 16 is positioned as a professional business laptop for the AI era, Lu said, without revealing the prices.

US giant Microsoft and China's leader Lenovo (0992) both released AI personal computers last year.