At a launch event over in Taiwan, SE Asia-Pacific’s vice president of marketing Peter Ang was quoted as saying that Sony Ericsson is hard at work on their next generation smartphone which is said to be based on Android 2.0. The good news here is that at least Sony is working on an open technology that gives them full control, but is an open platform that can easily expand, adapt and grow without being tied to a particular format. The bad news of course is that Android 1.5 isn’t even out yet, let alone 2.0. With that in mind, I highly doubt that, behind the scenes, Android 2.0 is so far along in production. I see this as meaning only one thing, don’t expect these guys before fall of 2010, easily.
The big problem here is that Sony Ericsson is hurting bad. Profits have dropped 50% over and over and the rumors keep coming that the two companies may split. All this just puts added pressure on a company that’s on the edge. Now, the good news is though that Sony is at least developing these phones and if they can come out with something that’s really different and maybe part of a larger plan, they have a chance at redeeming themselves and establishing themselves as a game changer. The reason is this: the iPhone wasn’t the first smart phone but it was the first one for the masses and this truly set up for the growth that the smart phone sector is seeing. A lot has came out since then, but it was again the G1 that gained attention and now the Palm Pre is earning its place. This means that the majority of people are just starting to transition to the smartphone market. As good as the Sony X1 is in the Mp3 market, I feel like that market is already fully owned by Apple and they are starting to go towards the smartphone market (Why have an iPod and a phone in your pocket when you can have one device that does both?). If the smartphone market is truly just beginning to grow, then Sony is still not late to the party, as long as they bring a product that’s part of a community of Sony services, yet is open and part of a longer term plan.
[Via Slashphone]
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