Vivo (technology company)


Vivo Communication Technology Co. Ltd. is a Chinese technology company owned by BBK Electronics that designs and develops smartphones, smartphone accessories, software and online services. BBK Electronics also owns Oppo, Realme and OnePlus. The company develops software for its phones, distributed through its vivo App Store, with iManager included in their proprietary, Android-based operating system, Funtouch OS.
With research and development centers in Shenzhen and Nanjing, vivo employs 1,600 R&D personnel, as of January 2016.

History

Vivo was founded in 2009, in Dongguan, China, and was named for the Esperanto word for "life".
In the first quarter of 2015, vivo was ranked among the top 10 smartphone makers, achieving a global market share of 2.7%.

Vivo

Since its founding in 2009, vivo has expanded to over 100 countries around the world. International expansion began in 2014, when the company entered the Thai marketplace. vivo quickly followed up with launches in India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam.
In 2017, vivo entered the smartphone market in Russia, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Brunei, Macau, Cambodia, Laos, Bangladesh, and Nepal.
In June 2017, it entered the Pakistan mobile phone market and the vivo brand is currently experiencing rapid growth in popularity in the country.
On 26 November 2017, vivo entered the Nepali market with its Y53 and Y65 models.
In 2019, it started operations in the Middle East.
vivo devices were also sold in the US under the brand BLU such as the BLU Vivo X launched in 2018.

Marketing

In October 2015, vivo became the title sponsor of the Indian Premier League under a two-year deal starting in the 2016 season. In July 2017, the deal was extended until 2022.
In June 2017, vivo reached a sponsorship deal with FIFA to become the official smartphone brand of the 2018 and 2022 FIFA World Cups. The company also became a title sponsor of India's Pro Kabaddi.
vivo has a sponsorship deal with the NBA in China, with Golden State Warriors player Stephen Curry endorsing the brand in China and the Philippines.

Phones

vivo has designed numerous phones, including several concept phones. vivo "V" series are the flagship cell phone models of the company.

Vivo Y-Series

Vivo V-Series

ModelSeriesDate launchedOther information
V1VJuly 2015
V1 MaxVAugust 2015
V3VApril 2016
V3 MaxVApril 2016
V5VNovember 2016
V5 PlusVJanuary 2017
V5 LiteVFebruary 2017
V5sVMay 2017
V7+VSeptember 2017It comes with 5.99-inch display, octa-core Snapdragon 450, 4GB RAM, 16 MP rear camera, 24 MP front camera and 3225 mAh battery. Soon after the launch, the phone was in news for wrong reasons. The phone was launched with 24 MP camera but the Snapdragon 450 chipset used on the phone can only support up to 21 MP camera sensor. Later vivo clarified that the updated Snapdragon 450 can support 24 MP camera, and Qualcomm later updated their official website to reflect the changes to the chipset.
V7VDecember 2017
V9VMarch 2018
V9 YouthVApril 2018
V11VSeptember 2018
V11 ProVSeptember 2018The phone comes with 6.41-inch Super AMOLED display, oct-core Snapdragon 660, 6GB RAM, 12 MP + 5 MP dual camera, 25 MP front camera, 3400 mAh battery. It also has an under-display fingerprint sensor & it has a dual engine fast charging with 18W power adapter
V11iVSeptember 2018The vivo V11i comes with 6.3-inch display, octa-core MediaTek Helio P60 processor, 4GB RAM, 16MP+5MP dual camera, 25MP front camera and 3315 mAh battery.
V15 ProVFebruary 2019This is vivo's first phone in the V series to sport a pop-up camera and a full-screen display without a notch. It is powered by the Snapdragon 675 and has a triple-camera setup at the back. V15 Pro packs 6GB RAM and 128GB storage. along with dedicated microSD card slot to expand storage up to 256GB. It is also the first phone to feature a 32-megapixel pop-up selfie camera. The phone has an under-display fingerprint sensor and Face Unlock. There is also a 3700 mAh battery that powers the phone.
V15VFebruary 2019The vivo V15 was released on 20 February 2019 in India and 20 March in Southeast Asia and Russia.
V17 NeoVAugust 2019
V17VThe vivo V17 released in India with 48MP AI Quad Camera and Ultra O Screen.
V17 ProVSeptember 2019The Vivo V17 Pro released on 20 September 2019 in India. The first with 32MP Dual Pop-Up Front Camera.
V19VApril 2020Vivo V19 in Global Version with Snapdragon 712 Chipset & Vivo Flash Charge 2.0
V19 NeoVJune 2019

Vivo X-Series

ModelSeriesDate launchedOther information
U10USeptember 2019It has 6.35-inch HD+ Halo FullView Display with a resolution of 720x1544 pixels and an aspect ratio of 19.5:9 with Qualcomm Snapdragon 665 processor and 5000mAh battery.
U20UNovember 2019It has 6.53-inch touchscreen display with a resolution of 1080x2340 pixels with Octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 675 processor and 5000mAh battery
Z1 ProZJuly 2019It has a 6.5-inch FHD+ with Vivo iView display which has punch hole design with Qualcomm Snapdragon 712 AIE processor.
Z1xZSeptember 2019It has Halo FullView Super AMOLED screen with an in-display fingerprint sensor and 4500mAh battery with Vivo Flash Charge.
S1SAugust 2019It has 6.38-inch AMOLED display with in-display fingerprint and powered by a MediaTek Helio P65.
S1 ProSNovember 2019The Vivo S1 Pro has a 48MP Quad Camera with 32MP Front Camera, 128GB or 256GB ROM with 8GB RAM, Qualcomm Snapdragon 665 Processor & 18W Dual Engine Fast Charging.
X1X2012The X1 was the first vivo phone to use a Hi-Fi chip, developed by American semiconductor company Cirrus Logic. vivo followed this up in 2013 by releasing the 2k-resolution screen phone, the Xplay 3s. Other popular phones in the vivo lineup include the X5 Pro, the X5 Max, and the Xshot.
X7XJuly 2016
X20XSeptember 2017
X21 UDX2018The X21 UD has an under screen fingerprint scanner. It used the "ClearID" technology developed by Synaptics.
X30 5GXDecember 2019The X30 was launched with the latest Samsung Exynos 980 Processor with 5G modem in the flagship smartphone, and has a quad camera with up to 60x digital zoom.
NexNEX2018The company launched a concept smartphone, vivo Apex, at the Mobile World Congress in 2018, which features a high screen-to-body ratio, a pop-up front camera, and two optical fingerprint scanners under its OLED display. The production version was named vivo Nex.
Vivo Z6 5GZ29 February
Nex Dual Display EditionNEX2018vivo launched the Nex Dual Display Edition, which features a second OLED screen, and triple rear cameras embodied at the back, with a lunar ring instead of a sliding module.
Nex 3 5GNEXSeptember 2019The Nex 3 5G has a Snapdragon 855+ Processor.

Controversies

IMEI Number Fraud

In June 2020, it was revealed by the cybercrime unit of Meerut Police that more than 13,500 Vivo smartphones used in India were running on the same IMEI number. The IMEI number is a 15-digit code meant to be unique to every mobile device. In 2017, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India issued a notification stating that all mobile devices would have a unique IMEI number, failure to which in the form of manipulation or tampering could lead to a three-year jail.
The events lead to the police filing a case against Vivo and its service centre. The lapse reportedly came to light when a police officer gave his mobile phone to the staff at the cybercrime unit for examination, as the phone was not working properly despite being repaired at a Vivo service centre in Meerut. The cybercrime unit found that the IMEI number of the device was different from the one printed on the box, and then forwarded the IMEI number to the telecommunications company providing the SIM service for the handset and asked for the relevant data. The company informed that as of 24 September 2019, the same IMEI number had been running on 13,557 mobile phones in different states of the country. The Meerut police reportedly handed a notice to Vivo India’s nodal officer Harmanjit Singh under Section 91 of the CrPC, and also registered a case under Section 420 of the Indian Penal Code.