Nothing founder Carl Pei: ‘If you’re serious about hardware, you should spend time in China’

Few founders have the know-how — or the guts — to take on Apple. But Carl Pei, founder and CEO of London-based startup Nothing, is one of them. Nothing makes smartphones and earphones at a fraction of Apple’s price, has shipped millions of units, raised $200m in September at a $1.3bn price tag — and is now exploring AI-native devices and apps. In this episode, host Amy Lewin sits down with Carl to explore how Nothing is approaching prototyping new devices, why Europe has struggled to produce globally successful hardware startups and what a future of personalised phones might actually look like. Carl also shares how spending time in China taught him the hardware ecosystem’s secrets, why India represents one of the biggest opportunities of our lifetime and which early-stage founder he has on his radar.

You can listen to Nothing founder Carl Pei: ‘If you’re serious about hardware, you should spend time in China’ online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Nothing founder Carl Pei: ‘If you’re serious about hardware, you should spend time in China’ is an episode from Startup Europe — The Sifted Podcast by Sifted.

This episode is 41:14 long.

This episode was published on Nov 27, 2025.

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