Remember the Saygus VPhone? A powerful Android smartphone, it got a lot of press in late 2009 and promptly vanished. Coming from a company nobody had ever heard of, we anointed it one of "6 Amazing Cell Phone Failures" in early 2011.
It turns out that Saygus is still in business; the company has pushed the VPhone through Verizon Wireless's "open development initiative" (ODI) approval process, and Saygus plans to start selling it soon. And the handset may have a lot going for it, including video calling that actually works over 3G and a super-open, hacker-friendly philosophy.
"The device is certified on our network and yes, it is the first Android phone to get [ODI] certification," Verizon spokeswoman Brenda Raney told PCMag. The phone also now appears on Verizon Wireless's website.
Don't Try This At Home
The VPhone story shows how insanely difficult it is for new mobile phone companies to make it through U.S. carrier labs. It also shows that even though Verizon now claims to have an "open" approval process, that doesn't mean products will be approved quickly.
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"We thought, and Verizon thought, it would only take us three to five months on the high end," Saygus CEO Chad Sayers told me recently. Verizon's website woos phone developers like Saygus, telling them to "expect the typical lab time to be weeks rather than months."
Yet it's taken more than a year for Verizon to approve the VPhone.
Saygus isn't the only company that's had trouble with Verizon's tough approval process. Sayers referred to a "multi-billion-dollar handset maker" which "couldn't get any of three handsets through Verizon's labs" and then went to smaller, Tier 2 carriers instead. He may have been talking about Huawei, which has had success with its Ascend smartphone on Cricket and MetroPCS.
"The time it took to get through the lab was unbelievable," Sayers said. "But this is our first handset, and we're working through the bugs."
Verizon's ODI initiative was primarily designed for machine-to-machine devices like thermostats and power meters. Verizon's online showcase shows 148 devices, including 10 phones approved through the ODI system. Eight of those ten phones are rugged Windows Mobile devices for businesses built by Intermec and Motorola. One is the VPhone, and the last is ZipIt's super-duper hospital pager, which I wrote about in March.
Saygus has had more than just lab approval problems. In a cutting post on GigaOm in 2009, James Kendrick used Sayers' past in the shopping-deals business to conclude, "I'm still unclear how Saygus could be in the top-tier phone business." Sayers last week sent me a point-by-point rebuttal of the questions raised in that story.
Sayers acknowledged that he's been working in "the shopping network industry" since 1994, but has been trying since 1997 to shift his business to mobile phones—thus the appearance on his shopping Web site of a 2003-era concept for the VPhone. He's just never been able to break through to U.S. carriers, he said.
But it sounds like he also understands that if you're going to promote vaporware, you're going to take some hits. So he decided to "go the quiet route" between early 2010 and now, when he's sure the VPhone is passing the labs.
Fortunately, it sounds like Sayers has enough of his own money to be patient. In a brief bio he sent me, he said he "made millions developing property pre-crash" and his family owns a construction business, as well as his other ventures.
From a tech side, Sayers is guided by Linux guru and former Sharp and TI developer Tim Riker, and former LG vice president Ash Darwish, who helped set up the relationship between Sayers and Verizon.
"Now we have some fantastic associations and relationships in the industry. We haven't had an easy run at this, and I believe that will only make us stronger," Sayers said.
Source:http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2391036,00.asp?kc=PCRSS05039TX1K0000762
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