Fujitsu's first Windows Phone device may be one of the first to ship if a claim by Japan's Nikkei newspaper is accurate. The device, briefly seen atWPC this week, is purportedly arriving in August. If so, it would come earlier than Microsoft's official fall window for Mango and could be the first to carry the new OS.
Microsoft has already hinted that Mango would be ready by at least September. Whether or not that coincides will depend on whether the OS will have already been shipping by Microsoft's Build conference that month or if it's only finished by that date.
The phone may get its early start through a quick port of an existing model. While it's possible the design at WPC was just a test example, it's physically identical to the Toshiba Regza T-01C from November. Fujitsu and Toshiba now work together on smartphone and could have simply adapted the T-01C. If so, it should have a four-inch screen and a 12-megapixel camera. Using WP7 Mango will dictate a second-generation Snapdragon processor.
Fujitsu has rarely set foot outside of Japan with its phone lineup and may decide to stay local with its WP7 phone. Both the Bluetooth SIG and the FCC have cleared the basic design and have left room for the hardware to reach the US if Fujitsu decides to go abroad.