- Pete Lau, the CEO of OnePlus, will take on an additional role as Senior Vice President in the company of its main investor.
- Lau's new responsibilities include overseeing brand synergy between Oppo, Realme and OnePlus.
- All three brands are under the umbrella of the mysterious "OPLUS".
OnePlus CEO and co-founder Pete Lau (née Liu Zuohu) began his career at Oppo. He rose through the ranks and eventually created OnePlus as an offshoot of Oppo.
However, it appears that he will see some sort of homecoming as he has officially taken on a new role as Senior Vice President overseeing Oppo. His responsibilities will mainly focus on brand synergy between Oppo, Realme and OnePlus, three of OPLUS 'key investment properties.
Pete Lau, CEO of OnePlus, will continue to be CEO
This does not mean that Lau is no longer monitoring OnePlus. OnePlus stated in a statement Android Authority the company makes this very clear:
Pete remains committed to his role as CEO of OnePlus. At the same time, he assumed the role of SVP and Chief Product Experience Officer for OPLUS and contributed to product and planning development.
OPLUS is a mysterious investor company that oversees OnePlus, Oppo, and Realme. A few months ago, Lau described the stake in this investor for the first time in an interview with OnePlus Fast company.
BBK Electronics technically monitors all three brands as well as Vivo and others. However, Lau claims that OPLUS has nothing to do with BBK. As always, the background funding and corporate hierarchy of OnePlus and its sister brands are puzzling.
So, is that good news or bad news?
As of now, it's hard to tell. Pete Lau has been OnePlus's CEO since the company's inception and that was his only official role. It's possible that Lau, with more on his plate, is distracting him from his OnePlus duties, which would undoubtedly harm the brand.
Connected: OnePlus Phones: A History of the Company's Entire Product Line
However, it's also possible that Lau's new role doesn't ask that much of him, at least not enough to adversely affect OnePlus. If that's true, then brand synergies between Oppo, Realme, and OnePlus are generally a good thing. This could add some cohesion to the increasingly confusing Chinese smartphone market.
Time will tell how that works out. In the meantime, things are unlikely to change too much at OnePlus for now.
