HMD (Human Mobile Devices) has partnered with Mattel to release a Barbie-themed hot pink flip phone this summer.
The announcement came ahead of this week’s Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Spain, where HMD says it will fully unveil the device. For now, it’s simply teasing it with a heavily pixellated photo:
Otherwise, all we have to go off is this marketing one-liner: “Promising style, nostalgia and a much-needed digital detox, this retro feature phone will flip the script on smartphone culture and will be this summer’s hottest accessory.”
It would seem that HMD and Mattel are capitalizing on last year’s massively popular Barbie film. The Margot Robbie-led film grossed over $1.4 billion USD (about $1.9 billion CAD) worldwide and garnered eight Oscar nominations, including those for Best Picture and acting nods for London, Ontario’s Ryan Gosling and America Ferrera.
Given this brief tease, it’s currently unclear if there will be any Canadian availability for the Barbie phone, but we’ll be sure to update this story once more details come out of MWC. MobileSyrup reporter Dean Daley is also at the show, so stay tuned to the site for more coverage.
Image credit: Warner Bros.
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