Since the launch of Android, we have been hearing rumors of (OEM) Original Equipment Manufactured Google Phone. We started seeing some Tweets from Google employees and others about a new Android-powered “Google phone” that was apparently handed out at an “all hands” meeting. Here are few of the sources:
Google Program Manager, who writes “Stuck in mass of traffic leaving work post last all hands of 2009. ZOMG we had fireworks and we all got the new Google phone. It’s beautiful.”
Another guy, Jason Howell, says he had his hands on the device, which he says is made by HTC and is running Android 2.1: “The new Google Phone runs on HTC hardware. I saw it w/ Android 2.1. Homescreen has new visual enhancements like animated desktop wallpaper.”
“Supposedly, Google employees were given tons of these phones today. unlocked,” he adds.
And one last one: “A friend from Google showed me the new Android 2.1 phone from HTC coming out in Jan. A sexy beast. Like an iPhone on beautifying steroids.”
We knew, this can’t be fake or just a rumor any longer. We had our eyes set on Google’s blog and here it is. Now, things go pretty clear as Google is confirming that this indeed testing a new Android device with employees around the world.
But mind it, this isn’t just another Android phone. Google is building their own branded phone that they’ll sell directly and through retailers. They were long planning to have the phone be available by the holidays, but it has now slipped to early 2010. The phone will be produced by a major phone manufacturer but will only have Google branding (Microsoft did the same thing with their first Zunes, which were built by Toshiba). There won’t be any negotiation or compromise over the phone’s design of features – Google is dictating every last piece of it. Like the iPhone for Apple, this phone will be Google’s pure vision of what a phone should be.
Ofcourse Google isn’t hardware manufacturer. The phone is being built by HTC, with a very close partnership with Google. From what we know, it seems to be a tweaked version of the HTC Passion or the related HD2.
What we know So far: It will be called the “Google Phone” and will launch in early January, 2010, will be unlocked.
The phone is more beautiful than iPhone (A sexy beast. Like an iPhone on beautifying steroids) and is “really, really fast,” says people who has seen one and used it. It runs on a Qualcomm Snapdragon chip (1GHz), has a high-resolution OLED touchscreen, is thinner than the iPhone, has no keyboard, and two mics. The mic on the back of the phone helps eliminate background noise, and it also has a “weirdly” large camera for a phone.
What is however, unknown at this point is the price. Stay tuned for more updates on this: Subscribe below-
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