Fast on the heels of Apple's iPhone announcement, the Linux Phone will soon be released. The OpenMoko-based FIC Neo1973, the smartphone is expected to compete against the Windows Mobile, Palm, Symbian and now OS X operating systems on mobile phones. The November 2006 press release read:
Openmoko today announced the immediate availability of a completely integrated open source mobile communications platform in partnership with FIC, a world leader in motherboards, graphics cards, mobile solutions, and electronic devices. The announcement of the OpenMoko mobile communications platform coincides with the unveiling of FIC's Neo1973 smartphone, which utilizes the full OpenMoko platform and will be available in January 2007.
Based on the initial specs, it will be released with EDGE, like the iPhone, instead of the faster 3G or HSDPA , I am having doubts if Europe and Asia will find it interesting.
We are in for a good 2007 in as far as mobile phones are concerned – I am expecting Apple and OpenMoko to step up and release a better spec'd phone within the year. :)
Why release an exciting product like this only to have it let down by support only for yesterdays technology.
They clearly don’t see Europe/Asia as a worthy customer base which is surprising since they are looking for developers to help improve their product and we probably move faster than North America in term as deployment of new network technology so could therefore also develop the next generation embedded apps for this device that people want.
I agree, Steve. This is the reason why Japan is so much advanced than the rest of the world in mobile technology with Asia and Europe not that far behind. North America is slowly catching up.
I can’t understand their reasons but i trust they have good arguments for the economical and marketing strategy. Mobile phone industry is really tough and full of surprises. Let’s wait a little bit longer and see what happens.