ASUS turns its ravenous gaze towards Apple

by Stevie Smith - Feb 5 2009, 09:05

Having already gorged itself on the Netbook market with its eponymous Eee PC ultra-mobile personal computer, Taiwan-based ASUSTeK (ASUS) is now preparing to take a wide-mouthed bite out of both Apple and BlackBerry in the smartphone industry.

Specifically, American navigational device specialist Garmin Ltd. has this week revealed a “strategic alliance” alongside ASUS that will see the two device makers developing and manufacturing a line of co-branded mobile handsets with feature-rich appeal.

And, unlike most forward-looking partnership announcements that hail as-yet uncreated wonders, ASUS and Garmin have already worked together for more than a year to produce the “nuvifone” G60 smartphone, which will be officially unveiled at the Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona this coming February 16.

Having worked side by side on the nuvifone’s development on a contract basis, the two contributors decided it made more sense to simply pool their resources as partners in order to create a strong foundation of innovation, explained Min Kao, chairman and CEO of Kansas-based Garmin Ltd.

While little is presently known about the nuvifone G60’s finer details, the handset will come complete with a touch-screen interface and will include a range of core features already established through Garmin’s navigational products.

AP reports that these will likely include driving directions, weather and traffic updates and connections to online social networking services.

The technology partnership will also see further new devices rolled out over the course of 2009 as the companies strive to “introduce the world to the benefits of (location-based services)-centric mobile phones.”

Neither ASUS nor Garmin have offered up any concrete information regarding regional availability for the nuvifone G60, or which mobile phone carriers will host it or how much it is likely to cost.

Around the Web