Custom Phone Firmware

Question

Hi,

I am looking to develop a custom phone (consumer item) which people can purchase in the market. I am wondering whats the best way to go about it? Basically am looking for a cheap phone on which I can customize the firmware as per my requirements. Something like Android but the price should be cheaper like 100$. I dont mind using a chinese phone also, as long as it allows me to customize the firmware. Do I have any options? The phone should only have basic features like Phonecalls and SMS and must be cheap and have an SDK or something.

Thank you.

Answer 1

To the best of my knowledge, there is no such device.

Getting a phone down to $100 retail price (without operator subsidy) means a high volume device. There are no open devices that I am aware of at that price point - these devices use one of a variety of proprietary/closed operating systems.

If you're talking high volume and can make commitments to this, then you should be talking to one of the OEM manufacturers such as HTC, but given where you're starting from based on these questions, I suspect that's not an option.

The closest to what you want is probably the OpenMoko device (http://www.openmoko.com/) but that's considerably more expensive (about $400)