Information gleaned from All Things D's Liz Gannes and Ina Fried has suggested that in 12 to 18 months time, there my very well be a Facebook branded phone on the market and its codename is 'Buffy'.
Facebook has been toying with the idea of releasing a branded smartphone for quite some time but has more recently settled on HTC as the manufacturer after discounting alternative, Samsung, perhaps as the company was responsible for unleashing competitor Google's latest phone onto the market.
The device itself is expected to sport a heavily tweaked version of Android, not unlike Amazon's approach to the Kindle Fire, though naturally this tweak will see Facebook placed at the core of the device's functionality and will focus around the use of HTML5 as the platform of choice for applications, which as we saw from RIM's BBX demonstration last month, can produce impressive results. The use of HTML5 makes a lot of sense for Facebook, applications created for the device could be quickly ported to the website and visa versa.
Facebook did not directly back AllThingdD's report but did release the following statement:
"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."
Facebook has slowly increased general integration into mobile applications already, aside from creating its own app, other applications now integrate into the Facebook Graph API to enable status updates and image uploads, though limits, especially from Apple's iOS are placed on areas such as payments, where Facebook users are unable to use standard Facebook credits for purchases. Perhaps then, as the company begins to hit these walls as it attempts to expand its mobile presence, it is time to branch out with its own mobile device and battle with Apple and Google on equal footing.
Having said all of this, evidence to support All Things D's report is heavily mixed, with the strangest statement coming from Facebook head of business development, Dan Rose, saying "this is really just another example of a manufacturer who has taken our public APIs (application programming interface) and integrated them into their device in an interesting way." We ourselves would find such a move from HTC a little odd without any special support or partnership from Facebook, though with the rumoured device 12 to 18 months away, anything is possible at this stage and it's not like a precedent hasn't been set, for example, with Motorola's new Facebook phone fast incoming. Nothing can be discounted.
