Smartphone maker HTC could be shopping around for a mobile operating system. In a report on the Focus Taiwan web site, HTC"s chairwoman Cher Wang reportedly told a Chinese media outlet, "We have given it thought and we have discussed it internally, but we will not do it on impulse." Wang added, "We can use any OS we want. We are able to make things different from our rivals on the second or third layer of a platform. Our strength lies in understanding an OS, but it does not mean that we have to produce an OS." Wang refers to HTC Sense, a user interface that has been installed in a number of the company"s Android-based phones. The UI is supposed to be used as an alternate compared to the standard Android user interface.
HTC is already selling lots of Android based phones and it also sells products based on Microsoft"s Windows Phone 7 operating system. But if it is thinking about gaining access to its own operating system, there might be a couple that are available to purchase. The biggest one is webOS which is currently owned by HP. The company decided last month to no longer sell webOS-based hardware products after the sales failure of its TouchPad tablet product. HP has said it will continue to develop the operating system but has hinted it might sell off the webOS.
Another mobile OS that HTC could buy is MeeGo, which is being used in Nokia"s one-off smartphone the N9. So far no other smartphone is scheduled to use the Linux-based open source operating system.