Facebook unveils its ‘home’ on Android phone

Invitations to a press event at Facebook’s main campus in the Silicon Valley city of Menlo Park rekindled talk of a “Facebook phone,” but analysts say the social network wants to spread roots across the Android platform.

         Technology news site TechCrunch predicted the announcement would be a modified version of Android with “deep native Facebook functionality” on a phone made by Taiwan’s HTC.
 

            Facebook has made a priority of following its more than one billion members onto smartphones and tablet computers, tailoring services and money-making ads for mobile devices.
“It is really clear from the stats and my own personal intuition that a lot of energy in the ecosystem is going to mobile, not desktop (computers),” Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg said in September.
“That is the future.”
 

             Zuckerberg rejected suggestions that Facebook would make its own smartphone, adamant that the company had no intention of stepping into the fiercely competitive handset hardware arena.
“Apple, Google, everyone builds phones — we are going in the opposite direction,” Zuckerberg said at the time.
“We want to build a system deeply integrated in every device people want to use.”
 

          HTC forming an alliance with Facebook makes sense since the handset maker could capitalize on the social network’s marketing power in an Android arena dominated by Samsung, according to Silicon Valley analyst Rob Enderle.
 

         “It is not so much a Facebook phone as imagined by Zuckerberg as it is a lifeline for HTC, which needs a champion device and got Facebook to back it,” Enderle said.
 

       If Facebook had been eager to build its own phone, it could have reached out to close partner Microsoft, which owns a small stake in the social network, Enderle reasoned.A Facebook-focused phone’s goal would be to make it intuitive to shop, search, post or do other tasks using the social network’s services.
 

           “A main page with a Facebook feel and your news feed nicely displayed, and optimized to allow you to live in Facebook much like you live in iTunes when you are on the iPhone.”
 

          If reports are correct, the device will help Facebook more easily connect with mobile users, and — importantly — deliver more ads in the fast-growing segment.