In our April Fools issue this year, I wrote about how Apple would be buying Iridium Satellite with an eye toward making the second-generation iPhone into a combined terrestrial/satellite phone (see "iPhone Goes International with Iridium [1]," 2008-04-01). Little did I know that only three days later, the EE Times [2] would report that a Finnish company called Elektrobit [3] has rolled out the first reference design for a phone that combines terrestrial and satellite communications capabilities using the TerreStar [4] networks. According to Gizmag, the handset is the only fully IP-based satellite phone using high-speed packet data; includes a touch screen and a QWERTY keyboard; and has integrated Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, USB, and GPS connectivity. Alas, it runs Windows Mobile, but on the plus side it doesn't have that massive antenna that Jeff photoshopped on to our hypothetical iPhone.

[image link] [5]

[1]: http://db.tidbits.com/article/9530
[2]: http://www.eetimes.com/galleries/slideShow.jhtml?galleryID=8&imageID=4
[3]: http://www.elektrobit.com/
[4]: http://www.terrestar.com/
[5]: http://www.tidbits.com/resources/2008-04/Elektrobit-phone.jpg

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