HTC announce new line of 4G smartphones...to Begin AT&T's BREW MP Onslaught

HTC has just announced a new line of 4G smartphones – the ThunderBolt will come out on Verizon, the Evo Shift on Sprint and the Inspire on AT&T. With these new arrivals, HTC’s portfolio of 4G devices has grown to six total, including the original Evo, the G2 and the MyTouch.

The Evo Shift, HTC’s newest Sprint device, features a slide-out QWERTY keyboard, a 5MP rear-facing camera and a low $149 price point that’s sure to attract would-be first-time smartphone buyers. The device has a relatively small, 3.6-inch display and no front-facing camera. The HTC/Verizon ThunderBolt comes with deeply integrated Skype technology and is part of Verizon’s all-new 4G LTE connectivity plans. This device also features an 8MP camera and a 4.3-inch display.

The Inspire, which HTC is partnering with AT&T to bring to market, features a arge 4.3-inch screen, as well as some new advances in HTC’s Sense technology, including an online component that will allow users to locate lost phones or wipe a phone’s data from a website. All three devices will ship with Android 2.2, a.k.a. Froyo; however, release dates for all phones aren’t yet available. Take a look at the gallery below, and in the comments, let us know which model appeals to you most and why.

AT&T this morning announced the HTC Freestyle, a new texting phone that is the first to use a common software platform designed to open up the world of feature phones to apps. The Freestyle runs BREW MP, a Qualcomm-made OS which lets developers write apps for many devices much more easily than the current range of feature-phone OSes, AT&T Mobility chief marketing officer David Christopher said.

"The significant limits of fragmented and proprietary operating systems have left millions of customers with few options for apps," Christopher said.

The Freestyle is an aluminum phone with a 3.2-inch touch screen and HTC's Sense software; it looks kind of like AT&T's HTC Aria Android phone, just without the Android. AT&T will introduce five more BREW MP-powered texting phones, which the carrier calls "quick messaging devices," this year, Christopher said.

"From this point forward, all of our quick messaging phones will be on the BREW MP platform," Christopher said.

He added that Latin American wireless carrier America Movil and Canadian carrier Rogers have agreed to use BREW MP as well, giving app developers a larger market for their software.

The thing is, we've heard this all before. AT&T first announced its BREW MP push at the last CES, in 2010. According to the schedule given last year, AT&T should have had two or three BREW MP phones by now. The carrier has none. The Freestyle will come to AT&T in February, Christopher said.