HTC pivots from blockchain to the metaverse for its next smartphone gimmick

HTC’s slow-motion fall from smartphone grace is reportedly set to proceed in 2022, with the corporate stated to be engaged on a brand new “metaverse”-focused cellphone in April because the remnants of the once-flagship smartphone firm continues to desperately cling to no matter zeitgeist time period it might probably to remain afloat, according to DigiTimes.

The information comes from Charles Huang, HTC’s basic supervisor for the Asia-Pacific area, who reportedly commented at MWC 2022 that the corporate could be introducing a brand new high-end smartphone subsequent month with unspecified “metaverse” options. Particulars are slim, together with any specs, markets it’ll be launched in, and even what sort of AR or VR options the brand new gadget will provide.

The information sounds quite a bit like HTC’s final main pivot in direction of relevancy: its Exodus line of blockchain phones that its supplied for the previous few years. Promising decentralized apps (“Dapps”) and a built-in cryptocurrency pockets, the telephones might run blockchain nodes and even mine paltry quantities of cryptocurrency, however — like many situations of blockchain know-how — it was an answer largely in the hunt for an issue that by no means actually took off.

For argument’s sake, a metaverse cellphone would not less than make barely extra sense than a blockchain one, if solely as a result of HTC has truly been a major player within the digital actuality area.

HTC’s important announcement at MWC 2022 was the debut of a nebulous “Viverse” — the corporate’s metaverse idea that guarantees to fuse VR, XR, 5G, blockchain know-how, NFTs, and extra collectively into a brand new, futuristic platform.

It’s even attainable to think about what a metaverse-integrated smartphone could possibly be, given the existence of tasks like Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Spaces or Microsoft Mesh, which goal to assist combine conventional gadgets like smartphones into VR and AR experiences.

In that vein, a high-end HTC “metaverse” cellphone might optimistically be one which ties deeply into the corporate’s VR headsets for an built-in, cross-device expertise that boldly modifications how we consider using smartphones (and different gadgets) in digital settings.

That stated, the metaverse cellphone may be a lackluster smartphone that has just a few half-baked VR apps preloaded. For what it’s price, HTC’s Viverse web site does explicitly name out that one will be capable to work together with its metaverse idea from “any cellphone, pill, PC, or VR headset,” full with a picture of a smartphone that seems to be doing simply that.

On condition that HTC’s Viverse doesn’t actually exist — nor does widespread adoption of any fashionable metaverse idea — it’s simple for the corporate to simply say it’s making a metaverse app or cellphone. In spite of everything, who’s to say that you simply aren’t?

Possibly the metaverse cellphone that HTC is launching might be a revelation, the form of product that launches HTC again to relevancy and places the corporate again on the forefront of the trade. However the firm’s current historical past doesn’t give a lot hope that it will likely be.

It’s nearly troublesome to recollect in 2022, however HTC used to make good telephones — gadgets for each Android and the totally different variations of Home windows Telephone that had been among the many finest {hardware} you could possibly purchase. Telephones like the legendary HTC HD2, the HTC Evo 4G, the HTC One X, the ultra-sleek HTC One, or the jewel-toned HTC U11.

However that was, in some ways, a special firm than the HTC of at present, earlier than the corporate offered an excellent chunk of its smartphone expertise to Google in a $1.1 billion deal back in 2017. Since then, Google’s Pixel telephones have solely gotten better and better, whereas HTC’s smartphone fortunes have languished.

Regardless of its {hardware} chops, HTC — like LG, Motorola (previous to its personal trials and tribulations with Google), and different Android gadget makers — was unable to seek out lasting business success, squeezed out by Samsung’s extra standard Galaxy gadgets on one finish and Apple’s iPhones on the opposite.

And that brings us to the HTC of at present: hollowed out of the engineers and designers that when made its telephones so nice, frantically flailing with blockchain telephones, metaverse telephones, and no matter different main buzzword comes subsequent to remain afloat in a smartphone market that hardly resembles the one during which it was a significant participant.

It’s not that HTC is totally devoid of ambition or good merchandise: the corporate’s nonetheless producing high-end digital actuality headsets aimed toward companies and just lately launched its unique-looking Vive Flow headset for extra informal clients, too.

Then once more, trying again at merchandise just like the Evo 3D or Fb-focused HTC Standing and HTC First — it’s attainable that being doomed to chasing gimmicks on the street to irrelevancy was at all times HTC’s destiny.