Facebook to Launch Phone By Next Year, Eyes HTC Purchase

From DailyTech: Newly public Facebook, Inc. (FB) is still recovering from a tumultuous initial public offering, and the criticisms and condemnations that ensued over its underwriter Morgan Stanley's (MS) questionable handling of insider information on the IPO. Now the internet giant has been forced to yet again address a regular rumor -- that it's making a smartphone.

But this time around the rumor has much more meat to it, thanks to a report in The New York Times. The report deals how Facebook has hitched up with Taiwan's HTC Corp. (TPE:2498) to make a phone code-named "Buffy". HTC will develop the hardware while Facebook would develop the software.

According to a Facebook employee, they were briefed that the company had snared "half a dozen" former engineers on Apple, Inc.'s (AAPL) iPhone team and an engineer from the iPad team to help with the project. According to the source and an Apple engineer who was recruited by apparently turned down the offer, this is Facebook's third shot at a smartphone.

The company's alleged first go in 2010 was leaked by TechCrunch, but never materialized. Likewise in 2011, "Buffy" was first reported on by AllThingsD, but the project yet again failed to show. Now it appears "Buffy" is back with a vengeance -- or so The New York Times claims.

An engineer working at Apple recalls meeting with Mark Zuckerberg and being grilled about intimate details about smartphones, including the nature of the various chips used inside the iPhone. While Facebook's past efforts have reportedly been modest, the new report indicates this time Facebook is getting serious, expanding its team of hardware experts to make "Buffy" a reality.

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