Purple Magic, a company based in France with a multinational management team, is pushing Linux mobile phones outward in capabilities and downward in price.
Positioned as "the only independent software vendor with a complete Linux solution for mass-market 3G phones", Purple Labs pushes its customers to "replace their legacy RTOS with a flexible and scalable Linux platform, accelerating development of feature-rich 3G phones while reducing investment".
The latest of these is Purple Magic, which Purple Labs calls a "reference design" for "the 1st sub-$100 3G Linux feature phone". Features include music playback, Internet browsing, video telephony and video streaming, in addition to plain old cell phone service.
And, as you can see from the picture, it doesn't look bad, either.
- Doc Searls
[photos here: http://www.purplelabs.com/download-photo.php]