When it comes to smartphones, it’s the expensive ones that get the most media coverage, like the recent OPPO Find X9. But, in a developing economy like India, the truth is that most people would never buy an expensive phone. Instead, budget devices are the ones that could make the most difference, giving first-time buyers the ability to surf the internet, watch educational content, and unlock a whole world of possibilities. OPPO has been making pretty decent budget phones for some time, and it’s just launched a new one, the A6x, which starts at INR 12,499. For the price, it comes with a Dimensity 6300 processor, a massive 6,500 mAh battery, and a 120Hz display.
OPPO sent over their A6x for me to test, and this review will culminate my experience with the device over the last two weeks, highlight its pros and cons, and help you make a wise buying decision.
OPPO A6x Review
Summary
At INR 12,499, the OPPO A6x gets a lot of things right. You get a stylish design that looks premium, a display that runs on 120Hz and is super bright, a battery life that’ll last multiple days, and performance that’s consistently smooth even with multiple apps running simultaneously. All this makes the A6x a well-rounded budget smartphone. If you’re looking for a smartphone in this segment, it’s worth considering.
Design & Hardware
It’s no secret that OPPO has been making pretty phones for a while, and I can say the same about its budget lineup as well. The A6x comes in two finishes: a sophisticated regular Olive Green and the one I received, the Icy Blue. Honestly, the blue is the way to go here simply because it makes a statement. OPPO has made some really pretty feather patterns on the back that catch the light at different angles, making the phone look ever so premium than it actually is. The finish is matte, so you don’t have to worry about smudging it with fingerprints, and also doesn’t slide off every slanting surface, thankfully.
The sides are plastic, as we all expected, and it’s not a bad thing. They match the blue accents and are flat, which is a new trend that I love to see. The ergonomics are decent, with the phone being fairly manageable with one hand. One thing I really love to see is the inclusion of a headphone jack, since not everyone shopping in this segment may have access to the latest wireless earbuds. The camera bump is pretty nifty and doesn’t make the phone wobble much on the table.
Beyond that, the fingerprint scanner is integrated right into the power button, and it works really well and fast. There’s an IP64 dust and splash resistance rating as well, which can help protect against accidents. As always, I’d like to remind all the ladies and gentlemen that they should never bring their phones near water, as water damage is not covered under warranty.
Display
The OPPO A6x features a 6.75-inch HD+ display with a 120Hz refresh rate. Yes, there are some thick bezels surrounding the panel, but at this price, it’s more than adequate. It gets the job done when it comes to playing YouTube content, mindlessly scrolling reels, or reading books. In fact, the brightness was one of the surprising factors, as the panel can get up to 1,125 nits. It made texts legible even in direct sunlight and was a really nice addition.
I also had a decent time watching some Apple TV content on the device, with good color reproduction and skin tones. Honestly, if you haven’t been using the latest flagship phones, the A6x’s panel wouldn’t feel out of place.
Performance & Software
Under the hood, the OPPO A6x houses MediaTek’s Dimensity 6300 processor, featuring 2 Cortex-A76 cores running at 2400 MHz and 6 Cortex-A55 cores at 2000 MHz, along with the Mali-G57 MP2. My review unit came with 4GB of LPDDR4X RAM and 64GB of UFS 2.2 storage. It is important to mention that 6GB RAM and 128GB storage variants are available as well.
Keeping the specs out of the way, the A6x’s everyday performance is actually really good. ColorOS has been my favourite Android skin for quite some time, and it, coupled with the 120Hz refresh rate, makes the A6x snappy. Light and even heavier apps like the camera open quickly with no delay, switching between tasks is smooth, and the RAM is enough to keep multiple tasks running at the same time. Animations are also really pretty, which makes the experience feel much more premium. That said, there are some pre-installed apps, but all can be uninstalled in just a few minutes.
To push the Dimensity 6300 to the limits, I also ran a series of benchmarks. The results? Not bad at all. The A6x scored 7,78 in Geekbench’s single-core and 1,931 in the multi-core test. In AnTuTu, the phone achieved 688,325 points. Moving on to gaming, I installed BGMI and played it at Smooth and Extreme settings. Overall, the experience for the price was really good. There were no dropped frames even in intense situations.
Battery Life
If there’s one thing I love about the A6x, it’s the battery life. OPPO has nailed it out of the park with an eye-watering 6,500 mAh cell. For context, when I used the phone extensively to capture camera samples, played a couple of hours of BGMI, and mindlessly scrolled reels, I ended the day with 30% battery remaining. For the average consumer, this battery should easily last 2 days. When you do run out of juice, there’s support for 45W SUPERVOOC charging, which takes the phone from 20% to 80% in just under an hour. You can also charge other phones using a cable.
Cameras
The OPPO A6x features a dual-camera setup, with a 13MP f/2.2 sensor on the back and a 5MP selfie shooter on the front. Despite the price, the A6x’s camera performance is decent. The camera, at least in daylight, produces pleasing images with ample details, accurate colors, and good-enough HDR. In low light, the story is a bit different as images appear soft and grainy.
Portrait mode was decent in ample lighting with accurate colors and a nice shallow depth of field. However, it all went downhill in low light, with images lacking crispness. That said, for the price, the experience is really good, and nobody should have any problems. Videos are capped at 1080p@60fps. The results? Pretty decent if you give enough daylight, and the stabilization is okayish as well. Regarding the selfie camera, the photo quality was once again serviceable in daylight. And as expected, the quality dropped significantly at night, with muddy colors and a lack of sharpness.
Verdict
At INR 12,499, the OPPO A6x gets a lot of things right. You get a stylish design that looks premium, a display that runs on 120Hz and is super bright, a battery life that’ll last multiple days, and performance that’s consistently smooth even with multiple apps running simultaneously. All this makes the A6x a well-rounded budget smartphone. If you’re looking for a smartphone in this segment, it’s worth considering.
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![Mercor’s Brendan Foody calls out Sequoia over ‘dual-pricing’ valuation tricks | TechCrunch
In recent days, founders and founders-turned-investors took to X to share horror stories about being mistreated by VCs. Their complaints ranged from VCs falling asleep during pitch meetings to investors suggesting a founder fire a co-founder.
Brendan Foody, co-founder of the AI talent platform Mercor, which was last valued at billion, went so far as to call out Sequoia, arguably one of the most elite VC firms in the world.
“The “sequoia scam” is worse than a single horror story,” Foody wrote on X. “in the last 6 [months] ive seen a half dozen rounds where sequoia invests in 2 tranches. everyone pretends they only did the higher valuation. founders misrepresent this to their employees & then shop it to angels too.”
TechCrunch has previously reported on VCs investing in the same round at different valuations. Under this mechanism, the lead VC firm invests a significant chunk of its capital at a lower, preferential valuation, while putting a much smaller portion of capital in at a drastically higher price. The massive “headline” valuation that gets announced manufactures the perception of a dominant market winner, masking the fact that the lead investor’s actual average entry price was significantly lower.
The disparity can be stark. For example, when the AI-driven IT helpdesk startup Serval announced a million Series B at a billion valuation, the announcement didn’t tell the whole story. According to The Wall Street Journal, Sequoia’s actual lowest entry point valued the company at just 0 million — less than half the headline figure. The gap between those two numbers is the gap between perception and reality that Foody is pointing at.
Serval isn’t alone. At Aaru, a startup that uses AI to simulate user behavior for market research, lead investor Redpoint backed the company at a 0 million valuation despite an announced billion headline price.
Sequoia’s Shaun Maguire pushed back on Foody’s characterization directly. “TBH I have seen some of this behavior but I think it’s unfair to call it the ‘Sequoia scam,’” Maguire wrote in response to Foody on X. “This has happened approximately five times during my seven years at Sequoia. What happens is other investors are willing to pay a high price for a hot company — usually AI — at multiples above what we’re willing to pay. So we try to decouple the company-building relationship with our partner from the capital, and this leads to two tranches at different valuations in close succession.
“I’m not aware of anything shady here,” Maguire continued, “but if you’ve seen it I’d love to know. VC is a repeated game, so it just doesn’t make sense for us to try to mislead people. And if anyone has, I’d love to know. And in general, congrats on the success of Mercor — it was a miss for us.”
Maguire’s response frames the practice as a market reality rather than a deliberate maneuver — Sequoia, he suggests, is simply unwilling to pay what competitors will pay for the hottest deals, so it structures its participation differently. Whether that explanation fully holds up depends on a question Maguire doesn’t address: what founders are telling the people who don’t already know about the lower tranche.
Although Sequoia appears to use this pricing mechanism most frequently, Foody acknowledged it isn’t the only firm using this tactic. And while the dual-pricing structures certainly inflate a startup’s perceived worth and help attract top talent, calling the practice a “scam” may be going too far.
That’s because employee stock options should theoretically be priced based on the blended value of all tranches — not the headline number — according to Jason Woo, partner in valuation and financial modeling at Armanino, whose firm provides the independent 409A appraisals startups use to set option prices. A 409A is supposed to reflect a company’s fair market value, giving employees a strike price that’s insulated from whatever valuation gets announced in a press release.
There’s a catch: 409A valuations are widely understood to skew low. Because a lower strike price means a smaller tax bill for the company, there is a structural incentive to keep that number down. The appraisal that’s supposed to protect employees from an inflated headline valuation is also, by design, not trying particularly hard to reach the top of the range.
The angel question is more complicated. Unlike employees, angels are writing checks, not receiving options. There is no independent appraiser standing between an angel investor and whatever number a founder chooses to share.
The dual-pricing structure is just one of way VCs and founders game the perception of success in a hyper-competitive market. Another, more pervasive tactic involves manipulating or outright overstating annual recurring revenue (ARR).
The VC Niko Bonatsos, a longtime veteran of General Catalyst who more recently founded Verdict Capital, addressed this issue during one of TechCrunch’s events in Athens last month. “We [at Verdict] mostly invest before metrics, before product, before the company [has fully taken shape] but I do have a past portfolio, and sometimes the conversations are telling. I’ll get a call or an email with a very high ARR number. I’ll think: I didn’t remember that company doing so well. So I reach out to the founder: ‘What happened? Why are the numbers so strong?’ And the answer is: ‘Oh yeah, it’s 365 times the revenue we made yesterday because one of our campaigns hit.’ So yeah, some of these terms have lost meaning.”
Foody declined to comment further. Sequoia didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
— With additional reporting from Connie Loizos
When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence.#Mercors #Brendan #Foody #calls #Sequoia #dualpricing #valuation #tricks #TechCrunchMercor,Sequoia Partners,Valuations](https://i2.wp.com/techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/GettyImages-1258486979.jpg?w=1024&ssl=1 "Mercor’s Brendan Foody calls out Sequoia over ‘dual-pricing’ valuation tricks | TechCrunch
In recent days, founders and founders-turned-investors took to X to share horror stories about being mistreated by VCs. Their complaints ranged from VCs falling asleep during pitch meetings to investors suggesting a founder fire a co-founder.
Brendan Foody, co-founder of the AI talent platform Mercor, which was last valued at billion, went so far as to call out Sequoia, arguably one of the most elite VC firms in the world.
“The “sequoia scam” is worse than a single horror story,” Foody wrote on X. “in the last 6 [months] ive seen a half dozen rounds where sequoia invests in 2 tranches. everyone pretends they only did the higher valuation. founders misrepresent this to their employees & then shop it to angels too.”
TechCrunch has previously reported on VCs investing in the same round at different valuations. Under this mechanism, the lead VC firm invests a significant chunk of its capital at a lower, preferential valuation, while putting a much smaller portion of capital in at a drastically higher price. The massive “headline” valuation that gets announced manufactures the perception of a dominant market winner, masking the fact that the lead investor’s actual average entry price was significantly lower.
The disparity can be stark. For example, when the AI-driven IT helpdesk startup Serval announced a million Series B at a billion valuation, the announcement didn’t tell the whole story. According to The Wall Street Journal, Sequoia’s actual lowest entry point valued the company at just 0 million — less than half the headline figure. The gap between those two numbers is the gap between perception and reality that Foody is pointing at.
Serval isn’t alone. At Aaru, a startup that uses AI to simulate user behavior for market research, lead investor Redpoint backed the company at a 0 million valuation despite an announced billion headline price.
Sequoia’s Shaun Maguire pushed back on Foody’s characterization directly. “TBH I have seen some of this behavior but I think it’s unfair to call it the ‘Sequoia scam,’” Maguire wrote in response to Foody on X. “This has happened approximately five times during my seven years at Sequoia. What happens is other investors are willing to pay a high price for a hot company — usually AI — at multiples above what we’re willing to pay. So we try to decouple the company-building relationship with our partner from the capital, and this leads to two tranches at different valuations in close succession.
“I’m not aware of anything shady here,” Maguire continued, “but if you’ve seen it I’d love to know. VC is a repeated game, so it just doesn’t make sense for us to try to mislead people. And if anyone has, I’d love to know. And in general, congrats on the success of Mercor — it was a miss for us.”
Maguire’s response frames the practice as a market reality rather than a deliberate maneuver — Sequoia, he suggests, is simply unwilling to pay what competitors will pay for the hottest deals, so it structures its participation differently. Whether that explanation fully holds up depends on a question Maguire doesn’t address: what founders are telling the people who don’t already know about the lower tranche.
Although Sequoia appears to use this pricing mechanism most frequently, Foody acknowledged it isn’t the only firm using this tactic. And while the dual-pricing structures certainly inflate a startup’s perceived worth and help attract top talent, calling the practice a “scam” may be going too far.
That’s because employee stock options should theoretically be priced based on the blended value of all tranches — not the headline number — according to Jason Woo, partner in valuation and financial modeling at Armanino, whose firm provides the independent 409A appraisals startups use to set option prices. A 409A is supposed to reflect a company’s fair market value, giving employees a strike price that’s insulated from whatever valuation gets announced in a press release.
There’s a catch: 409A valuations are widely understood to skew low. Because a lower strike price means a smaller tax bill for the company, there is a structural incentive to keep that number down. The appraisal that’s supposed to protect employees from an inflated headline valuation is also, by design, not trying particularly hard to reach the top of the range.
The angel question is more complicated. Unlike employees, angels are writing checks, not receiving options. There is no independent appraiser standing between an angel investor and whatever number a founder chooses to share.
The dual-pricing structure is just one of way VCs and founders game the perception of success in a hyper-competitive market. Another, more pervasive tactic involves manipulating or outright overstating annual recurring revenue (ARR).
The VC Niko Bonatsos, a longtime veteran of General Catalyst who more recently founded Verdict Capital, addressed this issue during one of TechCrunch’s events in Athens last month. “We [at Verdict] mostly invest before metrics, before product, before the company [has fully taken shape] but I do have a past portfolio, and sometimes the conversations are telling. I’ll get a call or an email with a very high ARR number. I’ll think: I didn’t remember that company doing so well. So I reach out to the founder: ‘What happened? Why are the numbers so strong?’ And the answer is: ‘Oh yeah, it’s 365 times the revenue we made yesterday because one of our campaigns hit.’ So yeah, some of these terms have lost meaning.”
Foody declined to comment further. Sequoia didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
— With additional reporting from Connie Loizos
When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence.#Mercors #Brendan #Foody #calls #Sequoia #dualpricing #valuation #tricks #TechCrunchMercor,Sequoia Partners,Valuations")
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