Alexey Miller, the chief executive officer of Russian natural gas
exporter Gazprom, seemed to be having a megalomaniacal moment when he
took over the company's website on July 16 and demanded a tablet
computer that could mimic all of the functions of a PC. While Tweeps
were quick to rib Miller when he said he would pay $3.7 million for the
device, that's nothing compared with Mark Shuttleworth's offer.
Shuttleworth, a South African software billionaire looking to break
into the mobile operating system market, is pursuing a $32 million
effort to develop a smartphone that can replace a desktop computer.
Unlike Miller, he's not paying for the project himself; instead, he's
asking other people to contribute on crowdfunding website Indiegogo.
Shuttleworth says he wants to push developers to test the limits of
processing power, storage and screen technology. "It's sort of like a
concept car," he says. "But instead of waiting three years to see if
something like it gets built, we're going to try and build it now."
The phone's specs call for the fastest processor on the market, as
much memory as a laptop (at least four gigabytes), and 128 GB of
storage, twice that of a current high-end iPhone or Android smartphone.
Also on Shuttleworth's wish list: a super-vivid 4.5-inch screen made of
sapphire crystal, which only a diamond can scratch, and a battery based
on high-capacity silicon anode technology. "The only place we couldn't
find anything really futuristic and classy was with sound," he says.
Shuttleworth got rich during the dot-com boom by selling a security
software company called Thawte to network infrastructure giant VeriSign
for about $600 million. He used part of that money to finance a 10-day
trip to the International Space Station and, in 2004, to launch a
company called Canonical. Few people outside of geekdom recognize the
name, but Canonical makes a version of the Linux operating system called
Ubuntu that's used by millions of software developers and data center
servers. Canonical has been in talks with smartphone makers to release
other phones running Ubuntu next year that can connect to a keyboard and
screen to simulate a home or office computer. Shuttleworth's project
would cut out the hardware companies.
Only donors willing to contribute at least $725 to the Indiegogo
campaign will get an Ubuntu Edge, Shuttleworth's phone, from the first
batch of 40,000. The project has already set a handful of crowdfunding
speed records and stands as the largest such campaign to date. Still,
it's only raised $7 million of the $32 million goal. (Canonical lowered
the going rate for the phone to $725 from the original asking price,
$830, after the initial surge of backers slowed.) "It's like a marathon
where there are people in tutus and dressed as bears at the start," says
Shuttleworth. "That's the fun part, but it gets tougher as you go."
The superphone may also have a tough time appealing to a broader
audience. Longtime industry analyst Roger Kay of Endpoint Technologies
points out that $725 can buy both a pretty good phone and a pretty good
laptop. "They still haven't sold me on why it's better to have both
things on the one device when there are cheap, kick-ass alternatives,"
he says. The Ubuntu operating system also limits the device's appeal, he
says: "Most people aren't Linux jockeys."
Shuttleworth argues that the Ubuntu Edge is aimed at early adopters
who want a cutting-edge level of technology in which most smartphone
can't justify investing. (Most developers spend about $50 million to
produce a new device.) "If you pick an exciting component, and it causes
you to have problems in the production line, then you're out of a job,"
he says of the hardware makers. If the campaign falls short of its
goal, Shuttleworth says he won't use his own funds to make up the
difference. "The people either want this or they don't," he says. "Let's
find out."
Image: Ubuntu, Indiegogo
