T-Mobile USA announced that it will launch HTC's Wing (pic), a smartphone running on Windows Mobile 6. This is the first smartphone to launch in the states with that OS pre-installed. The Wing will cost $299 with a two-year contract and will leverage the incremental advances of its brand new OS: emails can now facilitate embeddable images and graphics, email can be synched with Windows Live Hotmail and a lost or stolen handset can be wiped out remotely from an Outlook account. Windows Mobile 6 also allows Wing users to search remotely stored email and corporate address books. Since T-Mobile USA does not yet have a 3G network up and running, the phone's WiFi capability will be welcomed.
The Wing phone sports a 40-key keyboard that slides underneath its 2.8 inch screen. The Wing draws comparisons to the T-Mobile MDA, but it's much smaller. Up until now, only the T-Mobile Dash, also made by HTC, has had the option of downloading a Windows Mobile 6 upgrade, but the upgrade wipes the phone's memory clean. Other HTC handsets have gone on sale in Europe with Windows Mobile 6 pre-installed.
For more on the Wing:
- see this press release