Xiaomi has quietly set up a new company with a registered capital of CNY1.5 billion (US$235.3 million) through subsidiary X-Ring Limited, according to industry sources in China.
Shanghai Xuanjie Technology (transliterated from Chinese), which was recently incorporated, is wholly owned by X-Ring, the sources indicated. Its business scope includes IC design services; sale of chips and products; and sale of semiconductor discrete devices, the sources said.
Zeng Xuezhong, SVP of Xiaomi and president of Xiaomi's smartphone department, is reportedly Xuanjie's legal representative. Zeng is also the legal representative of Xiaomi Technology (Wuhan), having taken over the role from company founder Lei Jun.
Setting up Xuanjie could imply Xiaomi is looking to develop its own chips, the sources noted.
Xiaomi has not responded to the news.
Xiaomi through subsidiary Pinecone has already rolled out its in-house developed image signal processors (ISP) for smartphones. Fellow companies Vivo and Oppo have also launched their respective smartphone ISP chips developed in-house.
