Facebook might be finally launching its own smartphone on April 4th 2013. In an invitation titled “Home On Android” sent out to selected media and press Facebook invited them to witness Facebook’s new home on Android. It would be silly of a company like Facebook to set up a presser just to launch a version of Android application and thus it is more than evident that Facebook will be launching its own smartphone built on top of Android OS.
Sources say that Facebook phone will not be a standard android phone but will be running a forked version of Android just like on Kindle Fire range of Amazon. This spells more trouble for Google as a forked version of Android essentially means shut down of almost all revenue from those devices for Google. The Kindle Fire already is the leading Android tablet in the US but sadly does not contribute anything to Google’s income source.
Facebook might be a relatively young company and has zero experience with hardware but relying on HTC to create their hardware is a brilliant move that will ensure a well built global distribution presence. Services wise Facebook is well set and will need a bit tweaked integration into the OS for easy usage. Here are a set of features that Facebook phone will have
1. Phone calls – Facebook recently built its own VoIP service that essentially acts as Skype
2. SMS – Facebook messages integrated with the standard messaging app will act as iMessage on iOS devices. The user will be sending in a message to the the Facebook account of the recipient if he holds a Facebook account else it will be sent as a standard SMS.
3. News feed – Facebook will use the huge amount of data and personalisation depending on the users usage patter to provide a news feed right on the home screen
4. Extreme social connectivity – We will witness more deeper integration of Facebook in the OS for sharing media, instagram might be directly integrated right into the camera app itself.
5. Extras – Facebook currently provides free data service for accessing its site in countries like India. Imagine Facebook doing the same for all its services like phone calls, messages and instagram.
With Facebook already covering the most basic aspects of Media, Calls, Messaging and Social networks on its phone it is well set for a commendable device. Do join us to know more about what will be announced on 04/04.