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Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi announced on Tuesday that it would not be holding a physical event in India for the launch of its Redmi Note 9 and Redmi Note 9 Pro set for March 12 at noon over concerns related to the coronavirus outbreak.
“There is a global outbreak of Coronavirus COVID-19 that has affected people severely. Given this unprecedented situation, we have an important update for you. We won’t be holding any launch events on-ground throughout March in India. While we've been planning this launch for months, we believe this step is crucial. We are taking this decision with the objective of reducing exposure risk to Coronavirus COVID-19 for our Mi fans, media friends, partners and Xiaomi employees,” the company said in an official statement.
The company would be launching its devices virtually, live-streaming the same across its social media platforms.
“For the next Redmi Note launch, please join us online for a live stream launch on our social media handles and mi.com We plan to make this online-only launch truly Note-worthy,” it further said.
This is not the first time that a tech company has moved its event online citing coronavirus related concerns.
Sony announced its decision to withdraw from the Mobile World Congress 2020 due to health concerns in regard to the outbreak had shifted his press conference online to its Xperia YouTube Channel. MWC 2020 had been cancelled after more than 30 major exhibitors, and sponsors including Sony, LG Electronics, Nokia, Ericsson, Amazon, Facebook and more withdrew from the event citing coronavirus-related concerns.
Google today announced that it had cancelled the physical part of its largest annual conference Cloud Next over concerns around the current spread of COVID-19.
In another instance, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the organisation that oversees domain names and numbers for sites in a first, announced its decision to hold its ICANN67 Public Meeting online earlier this month.
The COVID-19 outbreak has claimed 2943 lives in China alone with over 80,0000 cases reported worldwide as of Monday.
Three new cases of the virus were reported in India on Monday including an Italian tourist travelling to Jaipur.
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