Nexus One: Google’s Super Phone 
ConvergenceAsia staff
07/01/2010

Google has launched the Nexus One, an HTC-built phone using Google’s own mobile software platform, Android. The high-end handset, described by Google as a ‘Super Phone’, will compete directly with other high-end Android phones.

The Nexus One may not be a game-changer in terms of technology or pricing, but it does reinforce Google’s ambition to become the first managed device platform (MDP) vendor.

The importance of the Nexus One is not in the hardware or pricing, but in Google’s control of the complete end-to-end user experience of the handset, from procurement to the delivery of web services to the device.

Google acknowledged that the move into online retailing represented a great leap, though it hopes to take this in ‘baby steps’. The Nexus One is the first of a number of handsets it hopes to sell through its online store.

The new phone can be purchased for either $529.99 unlocked or $179.99 with a two-year contract on T-Mobile in the US. It will also be available through Verizon Wireless in the US and Vodafone in the UK in due course.

At present, the Nexus One is all but exclusive to T-Mobile in the US. Although available unlocked, radio incompatibility means that it will not operate on AT&T’s HSPA network and will be limited to EDGE on the largest HSPA operator’s network.

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