A few months ago, Mozilla officially debuted Firefox OS for smartphones, but the first batch of phones were somewhat … lacking. But, according to Computerworld, the brand spanking new OS isn’t only coming to entry level mobile devices. Sony may be working on a high-end Firefox phone. Li Gong, senior vice president for Mozilla, said, “Sony is known for quality and user experience. So they are targeting the very very high (end). We are in join discussions on the kind of device.”
Besides Sony, the company is working on negotiating the development of additional devices, hoping to hit all spectrums of the market, both low- and high-end. So far, other manufacturers they are in talks with are Alcatel, Huawei, LG, and ZTE. Not bad for a newbie.
Gong is convinced that the Firefox OS stands a good chance of becoming one of the top three, next to Apple and Android. Why? “It’s because we are the only company that takes a pure approach. We are entirely open. Not only open source, but open process. No price, no nothing.”
While Android may be open source, according to Gong, developers can only have at it once a version is officially released by Google. Firefox OS would allow developers to be a part of the whole process, something Mozilla feels will drive interest.
The OS will initially debut this July in Europe and South America. But there’s still no word as to when exactly it will make its way to the already saturated U.S. market. Given the company’s plan to target new users, it likely is in no rush.
