Windows Phone Thoughts: The Canon Pocket PC that never was...

I received a very interesting photo and story from someone in Taiwan who obviously had an inside track to some very interesting news. It seems that Canon, makers of some awesome digital cameras, decided that they wanted to get into the PDA game last year. They went to a company in Taiwan to create their devices, did some mock-ups (shown below) and came very close to starting production (click on the thumbnail for a bigger version).



Somewhere along the way, however, the project got derailed. Rumours were that Canon lost faith in the manufacturer's ability to create the device to Canon's specifications, and the whole thing was scrapped. Based on the mock-up, this might have been a great Pocket PC. It was apparently going to have the same brushed steel look as most of the Canon digital cameras (like the S110). A metal Pocket PC? Awesome! And based on the mock-up, there was a camera involved.

And so ends the sad tale of the Pocket PC that never was. I wonder how many other "almost" devices are out there?