Canonical, the developer of the Ubuntu Linux operating system, has signed an agreement with a Chinese mobile phone manufacturer to soon ship Ubuntu phones to Chinese consumers.

Canonical signed a deal with China's Meizu to ship the first Ubuntu devices on the latest hardware in 2014. Financial terms for the deal were not revealed.

Meizu is one of China's most successful high-end smartphone manufacturers with over 1,000 employees, 600 retail stores and a global presence in China, Hong Kong, Israel, Russia and Ukraine. In January, the company announced its strategy to expand into other international markets as well as to ship phones in America later in 2014 and Ubuntu will be a key part of this expansion.

Established in 2003 and headquartered in Zhuhai, Meizu designs and produces smartphones created to provide a simple, intuitive mobile experience for people whose time is expected to be simply spent in using their devices, instead of figuring out the way of using them.

Specific dates for the phones' availability in China were also not released yet by either Meizu or Canonical.