Does the world really need a blockchain phone?
Sirin Labs is betting it does. The startup, which recently raised $157 million in an initial coin offering (ICO), is building an Android smartphone from scratch with special features for cryptocurrency enthusiasts: an app store for distributed apps (dapps), cold storage for private keys and easy conversion between tokens.
The Switzerland-based company says the product will fill a need in a fast-growing market: a secure device that can simplify the use of cryptocurrency across multiple applications. But as an old tech adage goes, "hardware is hard," and in blockchain it may be even harder, since devices must be engineered to protect not only information but unrecoverable money.
In a nod to the device's target audience, Sirin has dubbed the phone "Finney," after computer scientist and bitcoin pioneer Hal Finney.
Estimating this audience's growth over the years, Sirin Labs CEO Moshe Hogeg told CoinDesk:
"You have more than 10 million people that are all in crypto in one way or another. I think the community will at least double in size by the end of this year."
The phone is expected to retail just shy of $1,000, putting it in the high-end range with the likes of Apple's iPhone. And it can only be purchased using Sirin's crypto token (based on the ERC-20 standard). The firm sold 40 percent of the 573 million total tokens it created during the recent ICO.
As an Android device, the phone will include all the usual applications, including the full Google Play store. As Hogeg explained, "We're talking about user experience. If you don't have Facebook then forget about it."
But what makes Finney different is that sirin tokens will also be stored on the device to facilitate payments for a wide variety of dapps.
https://www.coindesk.com/blockchain-pocket-phone-behind-sirins-157-million-ico/
