Chinese smartphone vendor Oppo is partnering with local telecom carriers to give consumers firsthand experience of its 5G smartphones.

The move comes as Oppo plans to invest 10 billion yuan ($1.47 billion) in research and development (R&D) this year and expand its R&D staff to over 10,000 people.

Oppo said Friday that it is teaming up with China Mobile's Beijing branch, China Unicom's Shanghai unit and China Telecom's Shenzhen branch to allow consumers to try its smartphone Reno 5G, while the company will also establish experience centers in its flagship stores in these cities.

This is part of Oppo's 5G experience campaign, which is designed to collect feedback from users so as to optimize its products and services.

Tang Hai, head of the standards research center at Oppo, said success in the 5G era requires a robust ecosystem of device makers, operators, network equipment manufacturers, and application and content providers to drive growth and bring new experiences to consumers.

"Feedback (from the first batch of users) will help us better understand and tap the potential of the superfast technology for users, industries and society. The program will also help us see what it can achieve in reality,"Tang said.

Oppo is scrambling to gain first-mover advantage in the global 5G battle.

The company said at a launch event in Zurich in April that it will partner with Swisscom AG, a major telecommunications provider in Switzerland, to bring its first commercially available 5G device to the country.

Oppo's Reno 5G will be available in Switzerland at Swisscom Stores from this month and will enable superfast connectivity wherever Swisscom 5G networks are available.

Oppo said that in field tests, its Reno 5G model can achieve peak download speeds of 1,049 megabytes per second and peak upload speeds of 102 megabytes per second.

The next-generation smartphones are expected to be able to download high-definition movies in seconds and better allow for complicated virtual reality games.