SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters)-
Microsoft Corp. released two new phones for young people on Monday, marking another attack on the low end of the growing smartphone market, with BlackBerry maker Research in Motion Ltd and
The software company first tried to design its own phone six months ago, the company has introduced new Windows software for phones made by handset makers HTC Corp, Samsung Electronics Co. , Ltd. and others, which should be a more direct one for Apple's iPhone and Google's Android phones challenges.
Ross Rubin, consumer electronics and wireless industry analyst at market research firm NPD Group, said: "Kin is an interesting attempt to target the 15 to 25 mar market . ".
Mr. Rubin said success will depend largely on the pricing of the data plan, which is not expected in the coming weeks.
Microsoft did not say what the price of the phone is.
"However, even if the device is not successful, Microsoft is introducing some concepts that may be useful," Rubin said . ".
Kin One and Kin 2 are manufactured by Japan's Sharp and will be sold by Verizon Wireless, a joint venture between Verizon Communications Inc. and Vodafone Group Plc.
New phone-
Available in the United States and Europe in the fall-
Focus on combining feeds from Facebook, MySpace and Twitter to the home screen and allow users to build a network of friends to share photos, web links, etc.
Both new Kin phones have a touch screen that slides-
Keyboard and camera.
The Kin One is smaller and designed to be used only by One hand, while the Kin 2 has a larger screen and keyboard, more memory and can record high
HD video.
They combine Microsoft's Zune digital music player with FM radio.
Almost everything on the phone is stored in a remote server by Microsoft and accessed via the Internet via an online app called Kin Studio from any Web browser.
Kin automatically backs up SMS, call records, photos, videos and contacts to ease concerns about data loss.
On last October, Microsoft's Sidekick mobile phone users temporarily lost data due to a server failure.
Microsoft broke the tradition by working with only one handset maker, but stressed that Kin is aligned with its broader Windows phone 7 strategy, which will launch a new generation of smartphones later this year.
"This is not Microsoft's product," said Robbie Bach, head of Microsoft's entertainment and equipment division, at a Kin conference in San Francisco.
"Not only is sharp a manufacturer, they also sell their phones to Vodafone instead of Microsoft.
This is a very traditional model, but we have more involvement in design and hardware.
Traditionally, Microsoft has licensed its Windows phone software to a variety of mobile phone manufacturers, allowing them to control the user experience.
When Microsoft launched Windows Phone 7 in February, it acknowledged that this approach led to a decline in consistency for different models, a decline in consistency compared to Apple's carefully designed iPhone.
Microsoft plans to work more closely with handset makers, but Bach reiterated that it still has no plans to make its own phones. (
Supplementary Report by Gabriel Madway;
Edit Phil Berlowitz, Lisa Von Ahn, Andre Grenon and finish)