Telecom Lead America: Facebook is all set to foray into
the burgeoning smartphone market. Last year, the social networking major
partnered with HTC to work on smartphone, which has been codenamed as Buffy.
New York Time has reported that Facebook may come out with
its own smartphone next year. Employees of Facebook and engineers
briefed on Facebook’s plans, say the company hopes to release its own
smartphone by next year.
software and hardware engineers who worked on iPhone, and one who
worked on iPad, the employees and those briefed on the plans said.
blog TechCrunch reported Facebook was working on a smartphone. The project
crumbled after it realized the difficulties involved, said people who had
worked on it.
In the past, Facebook worked with HTC over two smartphones
known as ChaCha and Salsa. Both the smartphones came with a dedicated Facebook
key and tighter integration. Now the social network giant wants to go beyond
just the dedicated key and Facebook integration.
A Facebook employee told NY Times, “Mark is worried
that if he doesn’t create a mobile phone in near future then Facebook will
simply become an app on the mobile platforms.”
When asked, Facebook did not deny or confirm that a project
to build smartphone existed, but pointed to a previous statement it gave to
AllThingsD last year that said that the company is working across mobile
industry – with operators, hardware manufacturers, OS providers, and
application developers.
Facebook partners with Trend Micro for user protection from
malicious links
Recently, Facebook entered into a strategic partnership with
Trend Micro to help educate and protect users’ digital life against malicious
sites and malware.
editor@telecomlead.com
