Report: Microsoft In The Pink Over Verizon Cell Phone Deal

Creating a media frenzy, rumors that Microsoft and Verizon were in talks about a mobile phone deal blazed on the Internet after The Wall Street Journal Tuesday reported the story.

Citing anonymous sources, the paper said that Microsoft's touchscreen project, code-named "Pink," will hit the market sometime next year. Pink is reportedly a marriage between the Redmond, Wash.-based company's Windows Mobile and Zune software. The paper also said that a third party is "expected" to manufacture the rumored phone.

Microsoft is denying the story.

"Microsoft's strategy has not changed; it is and has always been to provide a software platform for the industry," the company said in a statement. "We work closely with many mobile operators and device makers around the world because customers want different experiences on a variety of phones."

A spokesperson stressed that the company is more focused on software development than hardware devices.

Windows Mobile runs on many different smartphones such as Samsung's BlackJack, HTC Touch & Touch Diamond, T-Mobile Shadow, T-Mobile Dash, Samsung Propel Pro, AT&T Fuze and several Palm Treos.

Tuesday's cell-phone talk followed a report on Monday by BusinessWeek that said that Verizon Wireless has been in talks with Apple over the last six months to distribute two new iPhone-type devices.

Anonymous sources told the magazine that one of the devices has been described as the "iPhone lite," since it is smaller and cheaper than its namesake.

The second product has been described as a "media pad" device that offers music, photo displays, high-definition videos and lets users make calls via a Wi-Fi connection. The purported product may be released this summer, the source told the magazine.

Blog reaction about the rumored Verizon/Microsoft tie-up was met mostly with derision. Several people made fun of Microsoft's Zune music player and accused the company of ripping off Apple's iPhone.

"Seriously, AT&T won't touch this thing; no reason to diminish the exclusivity of the iPhone," one person wrote on the MarketWatch Web site. "By the time VZ has crippled it and compounds the classic MS clumsiness, the "Zune Phone" will go from potential laughingstock to actual laughingstock."