PALO ALTO, Calif. – After years of considering how to best get into the phone business, Facebook tapped Taiwanese cell phone maker HTC to build a smartphone that has the social network integrated at the core of its being.
Code-named “Buffy,” after the television vampire slayer, the phone is being planned to run on a modified version of Android that Facebook tweaked heavily to deeply integrate its services and support HTML5 as a platform for applications, according to sources familiar with the project.
Facebook only recently chose HTC, after also considering at least one other potential hardware partner — Korea’s Samsung. That means the products themselves are still a ways from hitting the market, potentially as long as 12 to 18 months.
Although it has changed scope and leadership, Buffy has been an ongoing area of concern at the social networking giant for the past two years. These days, the project is led by Facebook chief technology officer Bret Taylor, several sources said.
A spokesman for Facebook declined to comment on Buffy directly.
But the spokesman added, “Our mobile strategy is simple. We think every mobile device is better if it is deeply social. We’re working across the entire mobile industry — with operators, hardware manufacturers, OS providers and application developers — to bring powerful social experiences to more people around the world.” More
