Xiaomi announces $13 Mi Band wearable with phone unlock feature, and first LTE phone

Rapidly-growing Chinese manufacturer Xiaomi announced its first wearable today, the Mi Band. While it’s a fitness band rather than a smartwatch, it does have one smartwatch-style feature: it can be used instead of a passcode to unlock Mi phones.

The waterproof Mi Band measures activity levels and sleep patterns, has a smart sleep-cycle alarm and claims to have a 30-day battery-life. Amazingly, it will be going on sale in China and Singapore for the equivalent of just $13 … 

It’s not yet known whether the Mi Band will make it into other countries.

Xiaomi also announced its first LTE phone, the Mi 4. While the company started out making lower-spec handsets, it has quickly established a name for itself in high-spec phones at affordable prices. Describing the Mi 4 as the “fastest and most gorgeous Mi Phone ever,” it has a 5-inch 1080p IPS display, a 13MP camera capable of 4K video recording, 8MP wide-angle rear camera and is powered by a Snapdragon 801 chip.

While Xiaomi is focused on international expansion, the flavor of LTE used in the Mi 4 will only work on Chinese networks.

Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun styles himself after Steve Jobs, doing Apple-style product launches while dressed in blue jeans and black top. He took it one stage further today, using the famous ‘one more thing’ line to introduce the MiBand.

[tweet https://twitter.com/sascha_p/status/491499901390319616/photo/1]

(via The Verge)