Back in February, there were reports that OPPO is working on their own in-house chip that will be used for their future smartphones. While it is known for have proprietary chips for its VOOC charging (and its various iterations), the said report also mentioned OPPO working on an M1 chip. Initially described as a co-processor, new reports have emerged that the M1 chip will be an ISP–similar to the role of Google’s custom ISPs in older Pixels and Xiaomi’s Surge S1 that is found on the Mi Mix Fold.

Short for Image Signal Processor, the ISP is responsible for processing raw data coming from the camera sensor, ensuring everything is polished before the final video or photo output. Having a good ISP is important especially if you are using large camera sensors like the ISOCELL GN1 or the Find X3 Pro‘s IMX 766 camera sensors. Beyond newer sensors, having a good ISP can even maximize the performance of older sensors, and this has been proven by Pixel phones and all of Apple’s iPhones.

What’s even more interesting is that OPPO will not be the only one using the M1 ISP chip. Being part of Project Mariana, the team behind it includes engineers from OnePlus and realme, which means we might see future phones from both brands (which are under the BBK umbrella) sporting the M1 ISP chip.

There’s no word when OPPO will formally unveil the M1 chip to the public, or which phone will first use it as of now. However, OPPO did trademark the M1 name last November 2020 via the European Union Intellectual Property Office.