Two Chinese smartphone manufacturers, Xiaomi and Meizu have entered the US smartphone market officially through US mobile carrier. But not all models of the respective companies are on sale, only select models have made it. US Mobile is said to use T-mobile’s network and is offering these smartphones by orders fulfilled by a third party.
The smartphones by Xiaomi which have entered US soil are Redmi 2, Mi3 and the Mi4i powered by Snapdragon 615. And only one smartphone from Meizu is being sold in US, the m2 Note. All these smartphones can be purchased with single payment or purchased in monthly installments through US mobiles.
The Meizu m2 is priced at $149 for one time payment and there is installments option too which is $9 per month for 18 months. And coming to Xiaomi smartphones the Mi4i is priced at $219, the Redmi 2 is priced at $119 and the Mi 3 is priced at $139. All three will be available in monthly installments as well. The news of the smartphones entering the US market is exciting as they have been restricted to Asia.
One thing to worry about is the lack of 4G LTE support to Mi3 and the the Mi4i, Redmi 2 and M2 Note although support LTE do not have the radio for T-mobile’s 1700MHz band. This means that these are as good as 3G enabled smartphones although they carry the LTE supported tag with them on paper. According to US mobile CEO, there will be devices which will be supporting proper LTE radios in the future.
