B&O Enters Phone Market With Serene

Posted Friday, January 19, 2007

Bang & Olufsen America, best known for design-oriented, high-end audio and video gear, is moving into the mobile phone space. A new mobile phone, Serene, is a result of the cooperation between B&O and Samsung Electronics Mobile Business and along with new announced phones from Apple and LG appears to be expanding the high-end options for phone users.

Since 2004, the two companies have collaborated to develop a unique mobile phone that is dedicated to one prime purpose: to enable comfortable and convenient communication. The result is a pure, simple phone of the highest quality.

During the development phase, engineers strategically converged notions of form and function to result in Serene’s minimalistic design and intuitive operation to be elegant, simple, and straightforward. The ultimate goal was to provide an alternative for those customers who demand the highest quality, who prioritize simplicity, performance and craftsmanship, and for whom less can be more.

By combining Bang & Olufsen’s concept development and design skills with Samsung’s leadership in mobile phone technology, engineering and quality, both companies saw an opportunity to realize a truly unconventional mobile phone concept. “Serene is the result of our vision to constantly push the boundaries of mobile phone development and bring to our customers unique and exciting products”, says Kitae Lee, President of the Telecommunications Business in Samsung Electronics.

“We wanted Serene to become a precious item, an item that is a personal expression of quality and convenience. The coherence to other Bang & Olufsen products is experienced through the design, and a very simple user operation,” says Torben Ballegaard Sørensen, CEO of Bang & Olufsen.

Serene consists of two equal parts that are bound together by a beautifully crafted aluminium hinge. The display and microphone are placed in the lower shell in a landscape orientation and the circular keyboard and loudspeaker are placed in the upper shell with an elegant thumb operated wheel in the middle taking care of all primary operations.

The colors, fonts, screen format and size have been specially selected with logical operation in mind. The relatively large, wide format display makes reading and writing on the screen even more pleasant. Additionally, restricting the number of features on the handset enables a decreased amount of user menus, which makes the experience both logical and intuitive.

Serene comes with a triangular table charger/docking station made in polished anodized aluminum with a cut-out for the phone. If the phone is placed in the docking station or is set to table mode it can be used as mini-laptop, as the display can turn 180 degrees for convenient use in this position as well.

“Consistent with our existing product line, Serene enhances the user experience and attention to every detail,” states Kim Gravesen, President of Bang & Olufsen America, Inc. “Alongside its impeccable performance, Serene produces the ultimate sound quality with its extreme emphasis on speech clarity and ambient noise reduction. It even carries its own, unique ring tone, specially composed to calm and attract (not alarm) the user to an incoming call.”

All features of Serene have been carefully selected to ensure user flexibility and intuitive operation. Serene includes built in camera, SMS, MMS, email, calendar WAP and Bluetooth technology. Serene will be distributed through Bang & Olufsen stores in North America this November.

The expected retail price is $1275.00.