So far we've seen manufacturers like Nokia, HTC, Samsung and Huawei release Windows Phone 8 hardware into the world, and today another company revealed that it wants a piece of the Live Tile action. Benson Lin, corporate VP of mobile devices at ASUS, today revealed to The Wall Street Journal that his firm is interested in creating Windows Phone 8 devices. Lin explained that ASUS is currently in talks with Microsoft about a Windows Phone 8 licensing agreement, going on to say that ASUS has floated the idea of a Windows-powered Padfone. "With our Padfone concept, the phone plus tablet, I think it makes sense for Windows 8," Lin explained. He added that ASUS is in talks with U.S. carriers about bringing its smartphones stateside by 2014.
ASUS has been focusing pretty heavily on Android as of late, introducing a pair of Padfones as well as a range of tablets, including the Transformer line and Google's Nexus 7. It'd be pretty interesting to see what the company would do with a Windows Phone handset, and it could be good for Microsoft to add another manufacturer to Club WP8.
What is still a mystery is how a Windows-based Padfone would work, because while the regular Padfone runs the same version of Android in both the smartphone and tablet modes, there aren't any Windows Phone 8 tablets or Windows RT/8 phones. Of course, Lin also noted that "there is no target timeline" for ASUS's Windows Phone plans, so perhaps something will change in the future that would make a Windows Padfone a possibility. Given ASUS's history with Android, would you be interested in a Windows Phone product from the company?
