Xiaomi banks on retailers, dual camera to capture new users

Lei Jun, CEO and founder of Xiaomi, takes a photo of Liu Shishi, an actress, with the Redmi Pro smartphone at the launch ceremony of the handset in Beijing on July 27, 2016. [Photo/Lei Jun's Sina Weibo account]

But its dual-camera technologies are not mature enough and it's still to be seen whether people who want better photos will buy this kind of smartphone or go for Single Lens Reflex cameras, Jin added.

Rumors have been around for a long time that Apple will roll out dual-camera smartphones but there are no such products yet, which means the tech giant is more cautious, she added.

The rollout of upgraded Redmi products is in time as Xiaomi's high-end gadgets have failed to generate expected shipments in the first half year, resulting in last year's crown-holder being squeezed out of the club of global top five vendors, Jin said.

The company has sold 110 million units of Redmi smartphones since the brand was set up in August 2013 and could be labeled as a "national" smartphone, Lei Jun said at the launch ceremony.

"To put it another way, we sold 1.2 unit of Redmi smartphone in a second," Lei said.