Optiemus to do CMF’s full-stack smartphone R&D

Optiemus to do CMF’s full-stack smartphone R&D | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement Day after Nothing’s CEO Carl Pei said that CMF will be a standalone Indian entity, the Noida-based Optiemus Group has said to join Nothing’s upcoming Series A investment round for the CMF.“This partnership is designed to go beyond ownership and manufacturing, with the ambition of building CMF into India’s first smartphone brand with full-stack, end-to-end R&D capabilities,” the companies said.Formally, the expanded partnership takes forward the manufacturing joint venture (JV) that Nothing and Optiemus announced in September 2025, which will make products for Nothing and CMF.The JV will now move into a deeper, more comprehensive partnership that will do manufacturing, ownership, and R&D under a single Indian entity with CMF.“CMF’s investment in local R&D and engineering is intended to build on that foundation, taking India’s role in the smartphone value chain from manufacturing towards technology development and global exports.”“India has everything needed to become a global technology powerhouse: extraordinary engineering talent, a huge consumer market, increasingly strong manufacturing capabilities, and a government that has consistently supported the growth of India’s electronics and manufacturing ecosystem. That foundation now allows us to take the next step: building India’s first full-stack smartphone R&D capability through CMF. We have already proven at Nothing that an independent brand can build its own design, software and engineering capabilities, create a global brand and ship millions of products around the world. Now we want to bring that blueprint to India through CMF, together with Optiemus, and build it here, for the world,” said Carl Pei.Ashok Gupta, Executive Chairman of Optiemus, said, “Nothing has already shown what this looks like in practice: building its own design, software and engineering capabilities from scratch, and turning that into a genuine global brand shipping millions of products. CMF is uniquely placed to bring that same blueprint to India, backed by Optiemus’s manufacturing expertise and a policy environment that is increasingly enabling R&D and innovation at scale. We are proud to build that capability with CMF and Nothing, from the ground up.” Published - September 22, 2026 01:28 pm IST