The Lenovo Ophone may be a little late to market, but according to the company its on way to China Mobile in September.
The Ophone, now called the Ophone O1, will be a direct competitor to China Unicom’s iPhone should the latter reach an agreement with Apple. Rather than run on a typical 3G network however, the Ophone will run on China Mobile’s homegrown TD-SCDMA network and use a customized version of Google’s Android operating system called Open Mobile System. The custom OS will come with pre-installed applications like instant messaging and email clients specific to China Mobile, and the interface is iPhone-like, visually.
From a technical point of view, the Ophone O1 is both high-powered and aesthetically pleasing. It features a 3.5-inch 480 x 240 touchscreen, 624 MHz processor, GPS, 5 megapixel camera, and possibly Wi-Fi. Wi-Fi is listed as an official specification, but the Chinese government tends to disable Wi-Fi in order to protect its TD-SCDMA network revenue.