HTC’s blockchain-centric smartphone Exodus that made a lot of headlines not too long ago captures a bit of spotlight once more. The consumer electronics giant HTC has recently announced that it had partnered with Opera which will ultimately lead Exodus having a lot more blockchain-related features and support for even more dApps (20 new apps, to be precise).
The news was revealed in a series of tweets on Exodus’ official Twitter page. Before this latest update, the smartphone’s most important blockchain features was the ability to trade and store CryptoKitties, as well as its cryptocurrency wallet and a key recovery mechanism.
The announcement included details about support for Numbers, Etheremon and Decentraland dApps in the smartphone’s ZIONVault integrated cold storage. For many, the most interesting addition is represented by Numbers, a dApp that tracks user data on walking, sleeping, driving, and similar activities. Numbers also allows users to sell their data to third parties for cryptocurrency.
In addition to these changes, Exodus’ inclusion of the Opera browser in its ecosystem means that users can now access the browser’s integrated crypto wallet (for Android) launched in December 2018. This wallet allows users to make micropayments in either to websites that support it.
Only Ethereum payments supported currently
Currently, the Exodus phone only supports Ethereum payments, but there are plans to add support for Bitcoin and Litecoin in the following months.
“Now you could pay an amount like 0.00002 ETH [equivalent to about $0.0027]. And never in the history of micropayments did that make sense. There’d be a transaction fee, or you’d have to share revenue with the app store,” Phil Chen, HTC’s chief decentralized officer, told Verge.
Chen also hints on future developments. The next step for HTC is to make all phones become “partial nodes” of a blockchain in order to facilitate trading between various phone owners. What’s more, starting in March, people will be able to buy the Exodus using cash and not just cryptocurrency, a welcome change that should help broaden the user base for the phone (and crypto adoption) even further.
