Samsung Roadmap: More PDA-Phones
By Joseph Palenchar -- TWICE, 11/11/2002
NEW YORK— Samsung plans to introduce its first two Palm-based CDMA 1x PDA-phones, its first PocketPC-based PDA-phone, and its first phone incorporating the Microsoft Smartphone 2002 (Stinger) platform.
All will be CDMA 1x trimodes and will be grouped in a product segment that Samsung calls "mobile intelligent terminals."
The company didn't reveal many details during a press/analyst briefing here, but it did say the Sprint/Samsung co-branded i330 Palm phone, due November, will feature color screen, Web browser, speakerphone, optional camera attachment, and 16MB of memory. It is 4.92 by 2.36 by 0.71 inches.
The other PDA models, due within six months, include the i500 clamshell-style Palm phone, also Sprint/Samsung co-branded. Features include 65,000-color 160 by 240-pixel screen, voice dialing/recording, IrDA, and gpsOne. It's 3.43 by 2.13 by 0.85 inches and accepts a camera attachment.
The i700 PocketPC phone feature embedded camera, gpsOne and color screen. The Stinger-based clamshell i600 features voice recognition, speaker phone, gpsOne and 4,000-color screen.
GSM/GPRS versions will follow sometime after these launches, said Muzibul Khan, VP of product management and engineering.
The company also plans a PDA phone based on the Symbian OS, but a launch date wasn't released. The company said it is the only company "developing and bringing to market" phones based on all three operating systems.
In general, Samsung in 2003 will offer phones supporting video-on-demand to stream or download full-motion video, POP3/IMAP4/SMTP e-mail access, and enhanced polyphonic audio, which will enable a phone to use a caller's lifelike voice as a caller ID ring tone, Khan said.
Product accomplishments in 2002 include phones with AOL Instant Messaging and WAP 2.0 browsers, which access WML and HTML web sites. Late this year, Samsung will ship MMS phones and its first color-screen phone with 260,000 colors.
