OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei's Nothing raises USD 15 million in Alphabet-led funding

LONDON: Newly-formed consumer technology company Nothing, a brainchild of OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei, on Tuesday announced it has raised USD 15 million in a Series A round led by GV (formerly Google Ventures), a venture capital investment arm of Alphabet which is the parent company of Google.

With new funds, the company aims to expand its operations in Europe with headquarters in London and release its first smart devices in the coming months, it said in a statement. "We are grateful to have a venture capital firm of this calibre help in building Nothing together with us. We plan to aggressively grow the company, in particular our R&D and design capabilities, to realise our mission of removing barriers between people and technology," said Pei, CEO and co-founder of Nothing.

London-based Nothing has so far raised over USD 22 million. In December, the company raised USD 7 million in seed financing in December that included tech leaders and investors such as Tony Fadell, Casey Neistat, Kevin Lin, Steve Huffman and Josh Buckley.

CRED founder Kunal Shah also invested in Nothing, although the amount has not been disclosed yet. "Carl Pei is a seasoned entrepreneur with marketing, hardware, and distribution experience that is key to bringing new devices to market.His vision for smart devices is compelling, and we have high confidence that with Pei's global mindset, the Nothing team will have a meaningful impact on the market for consumer technology," said Tom Hulme, General Partner at GV.

Starting this year, Nothing said it will bring back artistry, passion and trust to the field of consumer technology. The Swedish tech entrepreneur Pei had co-founded OnePlus in 2013 at the age of 24. After nearly seven years, Pei made the "difficult decision" of leaving the company in October 2020.