LG To Make Smartphone With Google Android OS
Details are still sketchy, but LG today revealed that it plans to deliver a new smartphone running Google's OS by the fourth quarter of this year in Europe. The phone -- the LG-GW620 -- will feature a 3-inch touch screen as well as a slide-out QWERTY keyboard.
The LG-GW620 will appeal to first-time smartphone customers by offering a new and different kind of user experience. "Our objective is to provide a wide selection of smartphones to satisfy the diverse preferences of today's consumers. This Android phone is just one of many smartphone models we plan to introduce worldwide in the years ahead," Dr. Skott Ahn, president and CEO of LG Electronics Mobile Communications, said in a statement.
LG plans to take advantage of Google's Android OS to make it easier for users to interact with social networks from their smartphones, the company said in a statement. Whether the phone will come with apps for Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn remains to be seen.
However, because the LG-GW620 is powered by Android, anything available for download in the Android marketplace should theoretically be able to run on the device.
The Korean phone maker also revealed that it plans to roll out a minimum of 13 new smartphones over the next 16 months, all of which will be built with Microsoft's Windows Mobile OS version 6.5.
Pricing and a domestic release of the LG-GW620 smartphone have not been announced.