BusinessWeek.com is reporting on what it says are details of Motorola’s planned Google Android based smartphone. BW is saying that Motorola’s inaugural Android effort will feature an “iPhone like touch screen” as well as a slide-out keyboard. It will also feature the Social Network features that we are already expecting.
BW says that Moto has been shopping around photos and spec sheets of the new Android phone over the past two months, and that the device is “likely” to be introduced in Q2 of 2009, according to anonymous “people familiar with Motorola’s plans.”
They are also reporting that the Moto Android phone will take some design cues from Motorola’s recently launched Krave ZN4, though they don’t know if such a device would feature the Krave’s touch sensitive clear plastic flip cover. Further anonymous sources tell BusinessWeek.com that the new device looks like a higher-end T-Mobile G1, but that it would sell for a price lower than the G1’s $179.99 price tag.
Intel CEO Paul Otellini (pictured) reportedly told the Associated Press that Linux will dominate sales of mobile Internet devices (MIDs). Meanwhile, ABI Research predicts that by 2013, Linux will outsell Windows by two to one in the combined market for MIDs, netbooks, and UMPCs. ...
eWEEK reviewer Andrew Garcia has posted an excellent, in-depth review of the first phone based on Google's Linux/Java-based "Android" OS. The T-Mobile's "G1" is a "worthy competitor" to Apple and the iPhone, Garcia writes, though enterprise users may wish to wait for bugfixes and missing features. ...
Nokia's Linux-based web tablets may soon gain faster processors and built-in 3G cellular modems. Nokia executive Ari Jaaksi revealed today in a keynote at the Open Source in Mobile show that Nokia will add 3G/HSPA capabilities to an OMAP3-optimized Maemo 5 release for the tablets. ...
A startup called NeoPwn has customized the OpenMoko Neo FreeRunner to act as a network security penetration testing device. Booting BackTrack Linux off a MicroSD card to perform penetration testing (pentesting), the NeoPwn is the first network auditing distribution for a mobile phone, claims the company. ...
[Updated Sep. 8] -- A blogger on KDEdevelopers.org has ported the KDE-based KOffice office suite to the Maemo distribution used with Nokia's Internet Tablets. The port between the two Linux-based environments is functional, but still has some problems, according to the poster, "mkruisselbrink." ...
China Unicom is distributing a Samsung Electronics phone that runs a mobile Linux stack from Mizi Research, a company that will soon be acquired by Wind River. Samsung's "Olympics" phone, also called the SCH-i859, is equipped with a Marvell PXA300 processor and a 2.8-inch touchscreen. ...
Google and the Open Handset Alliance (OHA) have announced the final winners for part one of the Android Developer Challenge. The OHA granted ten $275,000 awards and ten $100,000 awards for the best applications created for the Linux- and Java-based Android mobile phone platform. ...
Wind River announced it will acquire a Korean developer of Linux mobile GUI stacks. The $16 million acquisition of privately-held Mizi Research will bring Wind River "world-class mobile expertise" and will "accelerate its mobile services presence in Asia Pacific," says the company. ...
"Poky Linux" and Matchbox developer OpenedHand announced that it has been acquired by Intel Corp. The U.K.-based embedded Linux services team will join the Intel Open Source Technology Center, and will focus on Moblin development for mobile Internet devices and other mobile devices. ...
Hacker Holden Karau is porting the Devicescape Connect WiFi sign-on client to the Linux-based, open-source OpenMoko Neo Freerunner phone. The port, which uses the FreeRunner's new Qtopia-flavored stack, could turn out to be the first commercial application ported to the FreeRunner, says Karau. 
[Updated: Jun. 26, 2008] -- The Linux Phone Standards (LiPS) Forum announced that it will fold its standards-development activities and membership into the LiMo Foundation in July. The merge appears to bring British Telecom and Telecom Italia to LiMo, along with several key technology vendors. ...