Verizon Talks With Microsoft About New Cell Phone
According to a Tuesday report in The Wall Street Journal, Microsoft is at work wooing Verizon Wireless to help it launch a touch-screen cell phone sometime next year to compete with Apple’s iPhone.
The report cited company insiders as saying that Microsoft would be heavily involved in creating both the software and hardware for phone, though another third-party company would likely be responsible for production of the new gadget.
The Journal also stated that the new phone would utilize Microsoft’s Windows Mobile operating system and would likely come equipped with the software giant’s new Windows Marketplace for Mobile ““ an application similar to Apple’s popular App Store.
In response to inquiries about the newspaper’s report, a spokesman for Microsoft stated only that “Microsoft’s strategy has not changed; it is and always has been to provide a software platform for the industry.”
“We work closely with many mobile operators and device makers around the world because customers want different experiences on a variety of phones,” he added.
The Journal’s sources said that the company’s codename for the clandestine cell phone project is “Pink”.
In another pioneering partnership last year, Microsoft’s monolithic competitor Google teamed up with T-Mobile to create the T-Mobile G1 phone, which uses Google’s open-source Android software.
Curiously, the Wall Street Journal’s report of a Microsoft-Verizon joint venture surfaced just one day after USA Today reported a potential partnership between Verizon and Apple to develop a new iPhone for use with the telecom giant’s network.
To date, AT&T is the sole service provider able to utilize iPhone technology in the U.S. market. The Journal reported last week that the company was attempting to negotiate an extension of their contract, which ends next year.
The iPhone shook the telecommunications industry when it was released in 2007, boosting AT&T’s revenues significantly as millions of customers switched networks to be able to use the new gadget. Time magazine named the device 2007′s “Invention of the Year”.
Though declining to comment directly to questions of whether Verizon and Apple were talking, Apple spokeswoman Natalie Kerris did say that “AT&T is a very good partner. We have no plans to change the relationship.”
If the company does decide to produce a Verizon version of the iPhone, it would be the first of its kind to utilize the CDMA wireless network used by Verizon rather than the GSM technology used in AT&T’s system. Verizon has also said that it is working on a new network technology that would not rely on CDMA, though it would continue using the older network to transmit voice communications.
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