HTC unveils Android-powered Magic smartphone

The HTC Magic is due this spring

HTC has unveiled its Magic smartphone at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The handset is the first Android mobile phone to run on Vodafone's network, and is planned for a spring release.

Like T-Mobile's G1, the HTC Magic bucks typical design trends and is tablet-shaped. However, unlike the G1, it has no slide-out keyboard. HTC and Vodafone said that being based on Android will give the phone superior internet capabilities, as well as a platform engineered for personalisation and the use of feature-rich applications.

"Delivering an unbeatable mobile internet experience for our customers is a priority for Vodafone, so we are very excited to be introducing our first Android-powered smartphone in the spring," said Patrick Chomet, global director of terminals at Vodafone.

"Following our joining of the Open Handset Alliance, we have worked very closely with HTC to bring this cool new phone to the market. Our customers want to access a wide range of the most attractive mobile devices to help them make the most of their time, and the HTC Magic helps meet that need."

Peter Chou, president and chief executive at HTC, added: "The HTC Magic embodies the compact style and sophistication for which HTC has come to be known, with the powerful and intuitive internet experience for which the Android platform was designed.

"We are proud of our partnership with Vodafone and excited about making the Android-powered HTC Magic available to Vodafone customers in Europe."

The phone has a 3.2in touch-screen display and uses a trackball for navigation. Included as standard is access to a variety of email providers, and a selection of Google applications such as maps and search. Full details of availability and pricing will be available soon.

Christian Lindholm, director of mobile design consultancy Fjord, said that the new device was comparable to the iPhone and Nokia's N97 handset.

"I do think it's a huge step forward – the G1 was really a developer platform sold to users," he said. "It’s a worthy challenger to the iPhone and N97, although I'd prefer it to have a keyboard because text input on the move is almost chronically bad."

Continuing the Android theme, chip manufacturer Freescale used MWC 2009 to announce plans to add chipsets for the open source mobile operating system to its own roster.

Freescale said that it had worked with a number of firms and technologies to ensure that its chip ecosystem was capable of running a variety of operating systems. Freescale will pitch the chips at the small, lightweight netbook market.