U.S. technology companies Microsoft Corp., Intel Corp and Texas Instruments Inc. on Tuesday announced blueprints for new cellphones and handheld computer phones.
Breaking with the tradition of custom-designed technology for each cellphone manufacturer, the three companies will work to develop so-called reference designs, which, if adopted by enough vendors, could establish these blueprints as standards for much of the industry.
The companies aim to repeat what they have done to the personal computer industry, where Microsoft and Intel have standardized key software and semiconductor hardware, with the Windows operating system software and Pentium processors. Each product has more than 80 percent share of their respective markets.
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