Toshiba to release waterproof, fuel-cell powered phones

Toshiba's underwater concept marvel coming to life
Toshiba's underwater concept marvel coming to life

Toshiba's next generation devices look set to be coming during the next year as the Japanese company looks to raise the bar of phone functionality.

After TechRadar managed to nab a few shots of Tosh's concept devices at CES 2009, we all were left wondering if they would ever make it out the research lab and into the cold light of day, and the happy news is that they seem to be, although in slightly more consumer friendly formats.

Website Techblog has shared a 'leaked' product roadmap of the entire product cycle, and the main point of excitement for us lies in the 7-inch L01 handset, which is powered by a fuel cell and possibly Windows Mobile 7 if it launches next year, with a mighty purdy WVGA touchscreen.

Too many leaks

Others in the leak include the TG01 (due out later this year) successor the TG02, which adds water resistance (and not much else) and the TG03, which has a 3 channel speaker for improved multimedia performance.

And that's just the TG series, with a raft of other super-slim and specc'ed devices in the offing too. These include a QWERTY-keyboarded version of the TG01, catchily renamed the K01, which has a 15mm keyboard and Windows Mobile 6.5.

Then there's the K02 (it's obvious the naming departments have been having a field day) which is a flip phone with a 3.5-inch touchscreen and a QWERTY keyboard with a smaller screen and keypad on the outside.

Whether this is true or not only time will tell, but it certainly builds nicely on the concepts from CES, so we'll just cross our fingers and pray that the Lord Gadget on High is smiling kindly on us.

From Techblog via Engadget

Gareth Beavis
Formerly Global Editor in Chief

Gareth has been part of the consumer technology world in a career spanning three decades. He started life as a staff writer on the fledgling TechRadar, and has grown with the site (primarily as phones, tablets and wearables editor) until becoming Global Editor in Chief in 2018. Gareth has written over 4,000 articles for TechRadar, has contributed expert insight to a number of other publications, chaired panels on zeitgeist technologies, presented at the Gadget Show Live as well as representing the brand on TV and radio for multiple channels including Sky, BBC, ITV and Al-Jazeera. Passionate about fitness, he can bore anyone rigid about stress management, sleep tracking, heart rate variance as well as bemoaning something about the latest iPhone, Galaxy or OLED TV.