The Wall Street Journal reports that Samsung has once again delayed the release of its first phone running Tizen, the company's own open source mobile platform. The Samsung Z phone was slated to launch in Russia during the Tizen developers conference in Moscow in Q3 2014, but now the company has postponed the release indefinitely as Samsung and third-party developers fatten up the platform's ecosystem.
Additional specifications listed a 2.1MP camera on the front, an 8MP camera on the back, a fingerprint sensor, dual-band Wireless N and Bluetooth 4.0 LE connectivity, and NFC. Other features included a heart rate sensor, GPS, a barometer, accelerometer, gyro, a proximity sensor, and more.
Tizen is Samsung's answer to Android, a flexible and open mobile device platform that comes with multiple profiles to suit the devices we use today, including Tizen IVI (in-vehicle infotainment), Tizen Mobile, Tizen TV, and Tizen Wearable. The Tizen platform resides within the Linux Foundation and is directed by a Technical Steering Group.
This is likely the fourth time the Tizen phone has seen a delay. The phone was supposedly ready for a debut right before Mobile World Congress 2014 in February, but France's Orange SA decided not to release the phone because Tizen "is not as mature as we may have expected at this point." NTT DoCoMo was also expected to sell the phone but pulled the plug and shelved its plans.
The Tizen device was originally expected to launch sometime in Q3 2013, but sources claimed that co-CEO JK Shin wanted extra time to "create the best smartphone," thus pushing the launch window into Q4 2013 instead (which never happened). At the time, the delay centered on the hardware, not the ecosystem.
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