Report: Taiwan's HTC working on Facebook phone

Nov 22, 2011, 22:36 GMT

San Francisco - Taiwanese smartphone maker HTC is working with Facebook on a mobile device specially tailored for power-users of the massive social networking site, according to a report Tuesday by the Wall Street Journal's AllThingsD blog.

The report said that the phone, code-named Buffy, would run on a modified version of Google's Android operating system, which has been heavily modified to integrate Facebook services. The phone is still 12 to 18 months away from hitting the market, the report said.

A spokesman for Facebook declined to comment on Buffy directly, but told AllThingsD: 'Our mobile strategy is simple: We think every mobile device is better if it is deeply social. We're working across the entire mobile industry; with operators, hardware manufacturers, OS providers, and application developers to bring powerful social experiences to more people around the world.'

HTC also declined to comment.

Facebook has some 800 million users, of which 350 are considered 'active mobile users' by the company.

Several manufacturers, including HTC, already make phones with a dedicated Facebook button and the company's app is one of the most popular across the entire smartphone ecosystem.

But its increasing rivalry with Google, which is pushing its own social network Google+, as well as Apple's insistence on controlling user data and payments on the iPhone, make the idea of a Facebook-centric phone increasingly attractive at Facebook's headquarters, the report said.