Xiaomi's latest offering in the Chinese market is its brand new CC lineup -- a new range of camera centric devices to cater to young users. These phones are decidedly mid-range, and their main focus is providing camera experiences that a younger audience seeks, rather than solely providing an aggressive and competitive value experience. The new Xiaomi CC9 consequently comes with a 32MP front camera for better selfies and to support experiences like Xiaomi's Mimoji avatars.

Xiaomi's Mimoji implementation invited comparisons to Apple's Animoji/Memoji implementation because of certain shared similarities. Now, Xiaomi has released a statement in China clarifying that Mimoji has not been copied from Apple. People suggesting otherwise should back up their claims with proof, and continuing to propagate misinformation without adequate proof will prompt the company to "take the next stage of action".

Xiaomi Group's General Manager of Public Relations Mr. Xu Jieyun has clarified that Xiaomi launched the feature in May 2018, with the APK package name being Mimoji. Apple changed the name of its Animoji feature to Memoji on in June 2018. The functional logic between the two products is very different, and so, it cannot be said that Xiaomi lifted the feature from Apple.

Xiaomi's statement also came after the company did internal "self-examination", and that all evidence has been gathered and notarized before the statement had been issued.

Apple launched Animoji in September 2017 as an iPhone X-exclusive feature, allowing users to see their facial expressions rendered in augmented reality and superimposed upon certain emojis. In June 2018, Animoji gained Memoji capabilities, allowing users to create their own humanoid avatars. Xiaomi's Mimoji was launched in May 2018, allowing users to see their facial expressions rendered in augmented reality, and superimposed upon certain other emojis. Memoji gained humanoid avatar feature with the launch of the Xiaomi CC9. Samsung actually was the first OEM to "introduce" humanoid avatars when it launched the Samsung Galaxy S9 with AR Emoji in February 2018. The humanoid emoji concept itself had also been available before any of these OEMs could get around and integrate it within their phones and call it their own, so no one can really claim to be the original creator.

Source: Weibo

Story Via: GizmoChina, VentureBeat