Is it a useless but beautiful gadget or a trendy item for young people? A mini AI phone raises tens of millions through crowdfunding with emotional value | Focus Analysis

Author: Ou Xue

Editor: Yuan Silai

It seems that the mobile phone industry closed its doors to startups 10 years ago.

However, in 2025, an unknown company from Hong Kong launched an AI mobile phone and raised over HK$11.5 million on Kickstarter.

It doesn't feature the large - screen design of mainstream mobile phones. Instead, it uses a 4.02 - inch square AMOLED display, and its overall size is only half that of a traditional mobile phone. In addition, its camera can flip back and forth, and it can be fitted with a full - keyboard protective case.

Apparently, this is a product with light configuration but heavy on ingenuity.

IKKO's entry point is in line with the current trend - shifting from making general - purpose products to tapping into niche users. Some young teams with a keen marketing sense are emerging in a scattered way.

In the mobile phone industry, although AI is a standard feature of smartphones, there aren't solid real - world applications. What users can experience are mainly functions like voice assistants and recording transcription. In the early days of the industry, large manufacturers also failed to establish certain industry rules.

This is also an opportunity for startups. They don't need to launch world - shaking functions. Instead, they can win over some users by adding value in certain details.

Of course, for a hardware company to survive, it needs to continuously launch hit products and ensure continuous and stable delivery. IKKO has taken a light - footed first step, but after users' initial curiosity fades, it's always the product itself that wins.

A Smaller and More Flexible AI Mobile Phone

In the eyes of many in the industry, the popularity of iKKO Mind One Pro is due to its precise capture of the "emotional value" dividend.

As smartphone designs are becoming increasingly homogeneous, iKKO Mind One Pro stands out with its unique square card design.

This device measures only 86×72×8.9 mm, is equipped with a 4.02 - inch square AMOLED screen, and its volume is about half that of a traditional smartphone, challenging the industry consensus that large screens are dominant.

In addition, it doesn't attempt to replicate the functions of flagship phones on a 4 - inch screen. Its positioning is more like an "extension and supplement to the main phone".

A relatively innovative design is that IKKO has a 50 - megapixel 180 - degree flip Sony main camera. The same lens can serve as both the rear camera and can be switched to the front camera with one click, which means that the full capabilities of the main camera can be used for selfies. For small - sized devices, this can make up for the common shortcoming of a weak front - camera experience.

In terms of the system, iKKO Mind One Pro adopts a dual - system design. It has Android 15 built - in to handle the complete application ecosystem, and iKKO AI OS is a lighter "secondary system" that users can quickly switch to via a physical key. Among them, AI OS features a focus mode to avoid distractions and has built - in AI tools such as translation, voice transcription, and summarization.

This is a very smart focus.

Currently, the functions of mainstream AI mobile phones mainly revolve around three major areas: image enhancement, voice assistants, and system optimization. For example, OPPO's "One - click Flash Memory" can automatically extract key chat information and provide classified reminders; Honor's YOYO is mainly for daily life scenarios, such as automatically completing tasks like hailing a taxi and claiming coupons.

In contrast, iKKO Mind One Pro's AI path is more focused. Its dual - system design allows users to switch between the normal mode and the focus mode with one click. The latter restricts notifications and social applications, creating a distraction - free working environment, which is a very niche scenario.

In terms of business models, IKKO also shows a more flexible path different from mainstream manufacturers. Currently, in addition to hardware profits, Android manufacturers mainly make money from app - store commissions and peripheral hardware. IKKO follows a similar idea but in a lighter way. Its Pro version has built - in vSIM technology and provides free data services for exclusive AI functions in more than 60 countries. In essence, it incorporates the network cost into the hardware price and reserves space for subsequent subscription services.

Overall, although the "free hardware, service - based profit" model is difficult to implement in the entire mobile phone industry, for the niche market of portable devices like IKKO, the subscription system integrating software and hardware still has room for imagination.

Fashionable Accessory or Practical Tool?

While IKKO Mind One Pro has piqued the industry's curiosity, it also faces many doubts.

"It's more like a fashionable accessory than a practical tool." This is the evaluation of it by many online users.

In an era when performance is generally in excess, IKKO's configuration is several generations behind. The MediaTek Helio G99 processor it uses is a 2022 product mainly used in low - end phones. Moreover, while even thousand - yuan phones have a battery capacity of 6000 mAh, IKKO's battery is only 2200 mAh. With such a configuration, it can't even be used as a daily main phone.

Many consumers also have doubts about IKKO's advertised "free global network". A closer look at the terms on the crowdfunding platform reveals that this service is only for AI functions. Data - intensive applications such as regular Internet access and video streaming still rely on traditional SIM cards.

When it comes to the uniqueness of AI functions, IKKO faces greater challenges.

Its main functions such as real - time translation and voice transcription have already been implemented on mainstream brand phones, and the experience is constantly being optimized. As tech giants deeply integrate AI capabilities into the system as underlying infrastructure, it's becoming increasingly difficult for an independent hardware brand to create a differentiated advantage in the AI application layer.

Actually, as the AI mobile phone market matures, differentiation has become an inevitable trend.

On the one hand, mainstream manufacturers will continue to promote the deep integration of AI and the system. Honor's ecological strategy and OPPO's intelligent agent framework all point in the same direction: making AI an underlying capability of the operating system rather than a superficial function.

On the other hand, innovation in niche markets is constantly emerging. Directions represented by IKKO, such as the "intelligent companion", will continue to attract niche players.

Going head - to - head with large manufacturers in the technology battlefield, niche brands have little chance of winning. The real opportunities actually lie outside of technology - the unmet needs in appearance design and emotional aspects are becoming their breakthrough points.

In the next few years, the AI mobile phone market is expected to form a two - tier structure. At the top is the competition among the ecosystems of Apple, Samsung, and mainstream domestic manufacturers, while at the bottom are the scenario - based innovations of many niche brands.

For brands like IKKO, the core challenge lies in how to balance innovation and practicality, as well as niche and scale. After successfully validating the product concept, they can't avoid the test of performance, battery life, and ecosystem building.

Actually, many people think that iKKO Mind One Pro reminds people of the early BlackBerry phones - not perfect but unique enough. This also shows that the future of AI mobile phones is not just about more powerful chips and more complex algorithms, but also about rethinking "how devices can truly integrate into life".