$25 Firefox OS Smartphones To Be Released In India

Mozilla says the first Firefox OS smartphones based on the turnkey reference design revealed at Mobile World Congress (MWC) are set to be released in India later this year.

The turnkey announced by the non-profit organisation and Spreadtrum is now available to manufacturers and could eventually lead to smartphones running the open source web-based Firefox OS available for just $25.

Indian operators Spice and Intex say they will bring ultra-low cost devices to market in the next few months, hoping that even cheaper smartphones will convince consumers to upgrade from a feature phone.

Firefox OS smartphones

“Spreadtrum and Mozilla’s turnkey solution defines a new level in smartphone affordability,” says Xiaomao Xiao, vice president of software development at Spreadtrum. “Together with handset makers, we can now make the smartphone experience accessible to more consumers globally.”

Earlier this year at MWC, Andreas Gal, now CTO of Mozilla, told TechWeekEurope that the $25 turnkey reference design would offer a “full smartphone experience” that would compete directly with feature phones. However he admitted that it isn’t targeted at North America or Western Europe and is intended for emerging markets.

Mozilla is using the ongoing Mobile Asia Expo in Shanghai to show off two Firefox OS devices revealed at MWC, the ZTE Open II and Alcatel OneTouch Fire, both of which will go on sale this summer. The organisation has also revealed that Taiwanese operator Chunghwa Telecom has pledged its support to Firefox OS, bring the total number of operator partners to 22, including Telefonica and Deutsche Telekom.

“With more accessible Firefox OS phones coming to India soon, and the addition of Chunghwa Telecom, Intex and Spice to our team of global partners, it is clear that momentum for Firefox OS is continuing to accelerate,” claims Li Gong, Chief Operating Officer of Mozilla.

Last month, Mozilla announced it was accepting pre-orders for the Firefox OS Flame, a mid-tier reference smartphone designed for developers to test their applications in a real environment.

Are you a Firefox enthusiast? Take our quiz!

Firefox OS MWC 2014

Image 1 of 8

Alcatel Firefox OS
Steve McCaskill

Steve McCaskill is editor of TechWeekEurope and ChannelBiz. He joined as a reporter in 2011 and covers all areas of IT, with a particular interest in telecommunications, mobile and networking, along with sports technology.

Recent Posts

UK’s CMA Readies Cloud Sector “Behavioural” Remedies – Report

Targetting AWS, Microsoft? British competition regulator soon to announce “behavioural” remedies for cloud sector

11 hours ago

Former Policy Boss At X Nick Pickles, Joins Sam Altman Venture

Move to Elon Musk rival. Former senior executive at X joins Sam Altman's venture formerly…

14 hours ago

Bitcoin Rises Above $96,000 Amid Trump Optimism

Bitcoin price rises towards $100,000, amid investor optimism of friendlier US regulatory landscape under Donald…

15 hours ago

FTX Co-Founder Gary Wang Spared Prison

Judge Kaplan praises former FTX CTO Gary Wang for his co-operation against Sam Bankman-Fried during…

16 hours ago