Cyanogen snubs OnePlus for Micromax: What this means for Indian buyers

Micromax has announced an exclusive partnership with Cyanogen, who will become the sole manufacturer of CyanogenMod-powered devices in India under the brand name Yu. Tough luck, this announcement comes right at the time when OnePlus One is gearing towards its India launch with Amazon on December 2. The OnePlus One smartphone comes with top-end specifications with the CyanogenMod ROM of Android. This pre-rooted phone is expected to launch at an affordable price tag, which is why it has attracted the fantasy of plenty of geeks around. But the Cyanogen-Micromax partnership now puts OnePlus in a fix. In an official blog post, OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei admits “it was surprising and disappointing to hear from Cyanogen on November 26 that they had granted exclusive rights in India over the Cyanogen system to another company.” The post titled “A letter to our Indian users” aims to address its Indian customers who it thinks may feel “disappointed or deceived.” Now that Cyanogen has shifted its focus on Micromax, what happens to Indian users who have the OnePlus One smartphone waiting on their wishlists? While the CyanogenMod-powered OnePlus One will launch in India as planned on December 2nd, it’s most likely to not get updated. OnePlus explains that it will continue to be supported globally and receive frequent OTAs. However, Indian users might not receive future versions of CyanogenMod as an OTA update. That said, you can always flash Cyanogen Mod manually as it will be available for OnePlus One devices. The company has revealed that it will be releasing a Lollipop update for OnePlus One users in India and the first community build will be available as soon as December, followed by a production-ready build in February. OnePlus claims, “it will be bloatware-free and only carry the features important to our users. We appreciate the work that Google has put into Android, and we have no plans of departing from Material Design nor adding unnecessary customizations.” This was not something that OnePlus had originally planned, but the news has caused it to work on its own OS. As of now, it’s not clear whether OnePlus will continue to work with Cyanogen for devices outside India. While the CyanogenMod ROM has been one of the key selling points of OnePlus devices, the Micromax partnership seems to have soured the company’s relationship with Cyanogen.