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The founder of Pebble, well known in the Android community, is trying to bring about a small revolution in the mobile industry. Its objective: to push manufacturers to create a small premium smartphone under Android.
Is the “little” smartphone dead? If it still lives vaguely through certain “mini” versions of flagship mobiles, the smartphone tends to adopt ever larger screen diagonals. Eric Migicovsky, founder of smartwatch company Pebble, who is working on a chat app that will bring iMessage to Android, has set himself the new mission of resurrecting the one-handed smartphone.
He thus created a site called smallandroidphone.com, where he details the smartphone of his dreams. He says he wants a premium product the size and shape of the iPhone Mini or less, but running Android. The product would also benefit from an excellent photo module and a version of Android without an overlay. If Eric Migicovsky does not dwell on other components, for which he says he is “flexible”, he still mentions the Oled, a Snapdragon 8xx processor, or even the NFC. As for the price, it should not exceed $800.
Apple iPhone 13 Mini
Introductory price €809
“A small smartphone is not on any manufacturer’s roadmap”
However, the founder of Pebble does not intend to produce this mobile itself. “My goal is to get a lot of interest on this page, sign up tons of potential buyers, and convince a manufacturer to build us our dream phone.he explains on his website. I myself have some experience building hardware and how these things work. We’ll need over 50,000 motivated shoppers to make this happen, so share it with your friends!”. And to regret that “obviously, a small smartphone is not on any manufacturer’s roadmap”.
Migicovsky’s disappointment seems to have been driven by two things. The first concerns the end of the Xperia Compact series, which he greatly appreciated. The second concerns the Google I/O, during which Google presented a Pixel 7 deemed far too large. “I got the idea because I was watching the Pixel 7 announcement and I was like, ‘Holy shit, they’re just making another gigantic phone’, and that really pissed me off”he confided to our colleagues from The Verge.
Not sure, however, that 50,000 fans of small smartphones are enough to convince a manufacturer to embark on this industrial adventure with limited potential.