HTC’s Blockchain Smartphone is Now Available for Pre-Order

Bringing the limelight on prioritizing software and intellectual property, HTC has launched Exodus 1.

HTC revealed its flagship offering – blockchain based smartphone, which would only be sold in Ethereum and Bitcoin, on Tuesday along with the announcement of shift in strategy which would now focus on integration of disruptive technologies in HTC offerings.

Exodus 1 has been launched with the presence of a secured enclave – a private area in the phone chip that is kept in seclusion from Android OS that the device actually runs on. This secured enclave uses a technology conceived by the SoftBank Arm Holdings for keeping  the customer’s cryptocurrency in a safe environment.

“Think of it as a micro OS that runs in parallel with Android,” Phil Chen, HTC’s decentralized chief officer, told CNBC. “It basically is a wallet, but the wallet, what it does is hold your private keys.”

Chen also added that the advantage of keeping the Blockchain area of phone separate from the other part of phone chip is that since Google Operating System is very insecure in a centralized system, storing cryptocurrency there would have made the customers open to hack instances.

The prime reason behind HTC expanding its strategy in order to involve Blockchain Technology in the devices can be attributed to fact that the technology holds the potential to bolster the privacy and security of users’ assets and comes with the promise to protect customer’s identity and data in the coming future – something that the whole mobile industry is getting crippled from.

Exodus 1 will be able to run a number of decentralized applications and several digital programs which primarily operate on blockchain. The phone also features a “Social Key Recovery” functionality which lets the users get back lost access to funds once they lose private key through the help of a their trusted contacts.

Other than the decentralized blockchain functionalities, the Exodus 1 smartphone also has:

• 16 mpi dual back camera and 8MP dual front facing camera along with 4K video.
• Six inch display having quad-HD+ resolution.
• Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor.
• 6GB RAM and 128GB storage.

The early access of HTC Exodus 1 is now open for pre-order at 0.15 Bitcoins and 4.78 Ether token, a value that can be estimated at $960.

“Selling it in crypto only and being the first to do so means we are bringing this directly to the core audience and those who will want this device — the blockchain community,” Chen said.

HTC is not the first and only brand looking to make a breakthrough in the Blockchain smartphone market, there are other phone manufacturers as well who are entering this space.

Blockchain Powered Smartphones

Finney

Sirin Labs, the Swiss Based smartphone creators has the launch of blockchain based smartphone, Finney, in plan for November.

The phone, although an Android phone, will also run the Sirin OS. It will have a cryptocurrency wallet, a DApp store for getting access to Blockchain based apps, and token conversion service.

Huawei

While still not revealed for public knowledge, the news of Huawei launching their blockchain based phone is doing rounds in the smartphone market. For the development of the smartphone, Huawei is seeking license for open source OS, Sirin.

With smartphone manufactures now showing a keen interest in Blockchain technology, it is now only a matter of time when Blockchain will start playing a prominent role across industries.

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