Sony Ericsson Announces Nature-Themed S500

Sony Ericsson has announced its S500 slider phone, with a design based on the materials, colors, and cycles found in nature.

Sony-Ericsson has announced it’s slim new 500 slider phone, which features a slim 14mmm profile and design elements drawn in materials and cycles found in nature.

"It’s the small details that set these phones apart," explains Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications president Najmi Jarwala, president, in a statement. "Our designers have taken inspiration from nature to produce phones that are beautiful and alive with energy. They appeal to those that want to celebrate their individuality and express themselves through their choice of phone."

To that end, the S500 features constantly shifting themes and lighting which changes as day turns to night, and even alters with the change of the seasons or as a weekend gets underway. Graphics on the phone change automatically over time, the phone offers hidden illumination to highlight a certain event, and the phone’s keypad also glows when the slider is opened. The S500 will be available in "Mysterious Green" and "Spring Yellow" color schemes.

Under the hood, the quad-band GSM S500 will offer a 2 megapixel camera with picture blogging capability, music playback options (with support for MP3/AAC/AAC+/eAAC+), Internet browsing and RSS support, a built-in speakerphone, a sound recorder, Bluetooth 2.0 wireless connectivity, USB, and up to 12 MB of internal memory. Users can add their own media libraries via Memory Stick Micro media, and Sony-Ericsson is promising up to 9 hours of talk time and 370 hours of standby time.

There’s no word on pricing yet, but Sony Ericsson expects the S500 will land in North America during the third quarter of 2007.