London-headquartered consumer tech company Nothing has closed a $200 million Series C funding round, led by Tiger Global, bringing its valuation to $1.3 billion.
Investors & Funding Round Highlights
- Lead investor: Tiger Global.
- Other participants: Existing backers including GV (Google Ventures), Highland Europe, EQT, Latitude, I2BF, and Tapestry.
- New strategic investors: Nikhil Kamath (co-founder of Zerodha) and Qualcomm Ventures.
- Intended uses: accelerate product innovation, development and global distribution.
Business Status & Performance Metrics
- Founded in 2020 by former OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei.
- Cumulative sales crossed $1 billion by early 2025.
- Revenue growth of ~150% in 2024.
- Product shipments: “millions of devices” shipped over the years.
With this round, Nothing is shifting more explicitly toward building AI-native devices rather than just smartphones, aiming for hardware + software convergence, hyper-personalised operating systems, and multi-device ecosystems.
First launches of AI-powered or AI-integrated devices are expected in 2026, starting with smartphones, audio products, and smartwatches. Over time, the plan includes expanding into smart glasses, robotics, and potentially electric vehicles.
- The valuation at $1.3B makes Nothing a unicorn.
- Competing with giants like Apple, Samsung will require strong differentiation design, software, user experience.
- Scaling hardware businesses is capital intensive: supply chain, manufacturing, and global distribution are big operations. Nothing has already been building its manufacturing and supply chain footprint.
- As the company leans into AI, it will need to ensure privacy, trust, and robustness in software and user experience.
With this investment, Nothing is well-positioned to push forward its AI vision, expand its product line beyond just phones. The community round (retail supporters investing) is expected to be introduced, offering broader ownership. Launching new AI-native gadgets in 2026 will be a test of whether Nothing can deliver novelty, quality, and scale.
Overall, this funding marks a turning point: Nothing is moving from being a smartphone challenger to trying to define what consumer hardware/software looks like in the age of AI. If it succeeds, it could reshape expectations for design, interactivity and personalization in devices.
Read more on Tech Gist Africa:
UK’s Broken String Biosciences raises $15M