ASUS May Consider Building Windows Phones

ASUS May Consider Building Windows Phones

Microsoft's Windows Phone 8 operating system should gain traction in the near future as another company expresses its interest in manufacturing Windows Phone devices. 

According to The Wall Street Journal, Taipei-based ASUS is "interested in making Windows Phones," although there is no specific time frame as to when the devices will be available in the market. Benson Lin, corporate vice president of mobile communication products at ASUS, feels the PadFone concept "makes sense for Windows 8".

ASUS first came up with the unique phone-tablet-notebook hybrid concept at Computex 2011, and it became a signature feature for its first and second generation PadFone smartphones. Docking the PadFone into its Station or Station Dock accessory will transform the phone into a tablet or notebook running on Android.

Microsoft currently has strict regulations as to how its hardware partners design their Windows Phone or Windows 8 devices. It remains a question as to how ASUS plan to work around these regulations. However, Microsoft is said to be working on an update (codenamed Windows Blue) that will enable Windows 8 to run on smaller screen sizes, and improve its interoperability with Windows Phone 8.

LG Electronics recently revealed that it is also working on several Windows Phone 8 devices which will be released later this year. Currently, there are only four handset makers tha have introduced Windows Phone 8 devices. They are Nokia, Huawei, Samsung and HTC.

Source: The Wall Street Journal via The Verge