Acer taps Alibaba's Aliyun OS for new smartphone
The company says the phone will be made available in China, hitting store shelves there Friday.
Acer has inked a deal with China's largest e-commerce company, Alibaba, to use its mobile operating system in an upcoming smartphone.
Dubbed the CloudMobile A800, Acer's new smartphone will run Alibaba's Aliyun operating system. The cloud mention fits with Aliyun's deep Web integration, offering everything from Internet-based e-mail, Web search, weather updates, and GPS navigation tools. In addition, Aliyun synchronizes and stores call data, text messages, and photos in the cloud for access across other devices, including PCs.
Alibaba made some waves in the mobile space earlier this week after its chief strategy officer, Zeng Ming, said that his company was setting its sights on beating Android in China. He also told The Wall Street Journal in an interview that his company was partnering with "quite a few" handset makers, but declined to mention any by name. Acer was apparently one of them.
Interestingly, Acer won't be bringing Aliyun outside of China. According to the Journal, which was first to report on the handset, the identical device will come with Android elsewhere around the world.
Acer plans to launch the CloudMobile A800 in China on Friday. According to the Journal, it will cost 2,999 yuan, or $474.