Report: HTC and Facebook co-developing new smartphone
Strike up the band, it’s time to play an old favorite of ours around here. This tune goes by the name of “The Facebook Phone,” and though we have heard several variations on the theme over the past year or two we once again are being teased with a custom smartphone based around the social network. DigiTimes is reporting that an HTC scorned by Google’s decision to use Samsung for its Nexus line is now working closely with Zuckerberg and crew to develop a customized “platform exclusive to Facebook to enable and integrate all functions available on the social networking site.”
If this sounds familiar, just flip the record over. The HTC ChaCha and Salsa were released last year with a Facebook hardware button that made accessing the site or sharing content as easy as the press of a single button. We very well could be seeing a similar concept this year, albeit with more input from the mobile team at Facebook. But this new report suggests that the device could launch as a Facebook-branded experience, as THE Facebook Phone we have speculated on for what feels like decades.
DigiTimes has a tendency to create fire where there is very little smoke, so the extent to which the two parties are working together isn’t really clear. But one thing is almost certain: we will see another phone from HTC with a focus on Facebook integration at some point in 2012.
[via DigiTimes]