Xiaomi, China's hippest smartphone brand, could finally be ready to make its presence felt in the West over the coming months.
The company has long been referred to as the Apple of the East thanks to popular, well built, and smartly marketed smart devices such as the Xiaomi Mi4.
But all of this success has come from Asia, and mostly in its home market of China.
Several reports, including one from China's Economic Daily News, are now claiming that the company could be ready to take the leap west in 2015. In fact the company's new flagship phone, the Xiaomi Mi5, may be revealed at CES 2015 in Las Vegas from January 6.
And what a proposition the Xiaomi Mi5 could prove to be, if the rumours are true.
It's claimed that the Mi5 will have a 5.7-inch QHD display, a 64-bit Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 CPU, a 20.7-megapixel camera, and a fingerprint sensor. Other leaks have revealed a near-bezel-free design.
It'll also, of course, have the latest version of MIUI - a custom Android-based interface that has received widespread acclaim (and which looks and behaves quite a lot like iOS).
Other reports have claimed that the staggeringly well equipped Xiaomi Mi5 will come at an equally staggeringly low price - just $325 (£208). We're talking OnePlus One territory here, but with specs that are another step forward.
Whether Xiaomi will be able to make the same dent in the West with its online-only model and slick marketing is another thing entirely, of course, but it certainly has the resources to make a go of it.
