When the Phonebloks project was first announced it was met with a great deal of excitement. Then, a fair deal of derision as a ‘modular phone’ was deemed to be nearly impossible to make. Then, Google decided to take Phonebloks team and make its idea a reality, and we all went back to being very, very excited all over again.
A year on from its first reveal we now have a working prototype. And we’re not talking about some bare-bones components with a screen stuck on to it – this particular prototype looks an awful lot like the mockups of the final release that you’ve probably seen used as the feature image on articles all over the web whenever Project Ara is brought up.
This is especially promising given Project Ara’s targeted Q1 2015 release date. Check out the short video at the top of the page to see for yourself. It’s filmed by one of the Phonebloks team as he takes a journey into the heart of Project Ara’s engineering lab. Within, a Google engineer shows the basic skeleton of the smartphone before sliding in each of the modular components one by one, from processor to speakers.
The video also reminds us that there will be the first ever pair of Project Ara developers conferences in the coming January (the 14th for the Americas and Europe and 15th for Asia-Pacific). We can’t wait.
