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LGE's Touch-Screen Cell Phones to Compete With iPhone in US(Korea Times Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) By Kim Yoo-chul Staff Reporter LG Electronics aims to expand its share of the North American market with new touch-screen phones. With attractive prices and distinctive features, the new phones will challenge Apple's iPhone, as touch-screens are expected to be hot gift items ahead of the Christmas season. On Sunday, the world's fifth-largest handset maker announced its launch of two new touch-screen phones _ Voyager and Venus. Verizon Wireless, the second-largest U.S. mobile-phone carrier in the U.S., will undertake the marketing of the new phones. LG is the first Korean cell phone maker to sell touch-screen phones in the U.S. ``The Voyager phone will have a retail price tag of about $350, and the Venus model one of $250,'' a LG spokesperson said. The suggested price of an eight-gigabyte Voyager is lower than that of the iPhone, which is selling at about $399 in the U.S. The iPhone hit the U.S. market in June with an original price of $599, but Apple reduced the price by $200 to attract more subscribers for the upcoming holiday season. Unlike the iPhone, the Voyager folds out to reveal a keyboard, while allowing users to send and receive messages, and watch and listen to mobile TV on its dual speakers, simply by touching the 2.8-inch LCD screen. With its touch-sensitive stylish slide navigation, the Venus, is armored with the industry's first ``Interactive User Interface,'' which enables the upper and lower screens to interact when operating the navigation system. Both models offer Verizon's ``Vcast'' video and music services, while supporting a micro Secure Digital memory card with an eight-gigabyte capacity in which users can store up to 2,000 music files with a single music storage of four-megabyte, according to the company. Earlier this month, Sprint Nextel, the third of the three largest U.S. wireless carriers after the iPhone, introduced the touch-screen phones of Taiwan-based HTC for $250 with a two-year contract. LG opened the new chapter of the high-end touch-screen phone industry with the successful launching of the Prada phone early this year, but the pricey gadget did not drawn much customer attention in South Korea, one of the world's most Internet-savvy countries. Copyright 2007 The Korea Times Company Ltd, Source: The Financial Times Limited |