Too little. too late computer vendor Acer is planning to introduce an Android-based smart phone by the end of the year to add to the ten phones based on Windows Mobile already in the works for 2009. This antediluvian phone on the left with the QWERTY keyboard but it sadly gives an idea the way that Acer is thinking.
Acer’s chances of getting a serious amount of the action is the square root of sod all but Acer’s head of mobile-phone products Aymar de Lencquesaing (If only all IT people had such romantically wonderful names) said that the world’s third largest computer maker had made no formal announcements around Android, though ‘it’s likely that we’ll have one in 2009.’
Good. Nay, excellent. But a small flaw. In February, at Mobile World Congress, Acer unveiled its first four cellphones, which are based on no, not Android, but on Windows Mobile.
Thus Acer is going to smash it way into the highly competitive smartphone market and switch operating systems at the same time. A smart trick if you can manage it.
Aymar De Lencquesaing (important to get that name in as often as possible for it sings romance) earlier said, ‘One of the pain points for users around the world is how do I basically port my environment from one device to another? Because we have a suite of products in the mobile-data space that covers the whole spectrum, we can offer synchronization between all devices.’
First we get his splendid name, Aymar De Lencquesaing, and then we get a new IT cliche ‘pain point’.
OK, the pain point for Acer is that the train has already left the station.
De Lencquesaing estimates the company will need to sell in the region between 20 million to 25 million devices a year to reach its goal, based on its analysis of the market. And it is going to do this with a smart phone which is a few years later to market and has swapped operating systems and has nothing sexier going for it that the name of Acer’s head of mobile-phone products? Pigs will fly first.
Earlier this year, its Chairman J.T. Wang said the company needs to start offering smartphones, which he believes could eventually supersede PCs altogether. In that he is right. But it is very doubtful it will be an Acer.
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