In India, based on my friends and families' experience, you have three options for phones: pay a lot for an awesome Samsung with clean UI and customisation, pay very less for a Xiaomi with a LOT of bloat, or Indian brands in the middle that always have a major flaw where they cut costs.
CMF is wildly popular because it's cheap but also has clean software. I doubt they'll slow down even with pre installed apps because we're so used to ads in the file manager.
But from what I see on this community, people are buying Nothing products more so for the design over price (as well as the same clean software). So many people bought Phone 3 at launch price, and despite all the complaints, I have to admit it's a very pretty phone.
So maybe Nothing has created another option for people: pay nearly the same price as a CMF for a prettier back. However, since it's a new launch, they get to sell it at the original price of the CMF while it's probably selling at discount now.
