HTC announces plans for the Exodus 1s, a cheaper blockchain smartphone

Despite its financial woes, HTC appears determined to keep making new smartphones, even in the most niche of niche markets. Following in the footsteps of the HTC Exodus flagship blockchain smartphone, now sold out, the Taiwanese smartphone maker is developing a lower cost sequel dubbed the Exodus 1s. Although details such as the device’s specifications are scant at this stage it is known that HTC is targeting a US$250-300 price range and that the Exodus 1s will be able to run a full blockchain node.

For enthusiasts of Bitcoin and blockchain, being able to use your phone to run a full node will undoubtedly offer some appeal. It is a feature upgrade that will roll out to the original Exodus as well and will also users to use their phone to act as a validation and transaction hub on the Bitcoin blockchain. Although not capable of bitcoin mining itself, HTC is looking to partner with companies who are willing to offer Exodus users hash rates in exchange for the processing power of their devices.

"There is a shortage of full nodes in the network," Chen said when speaking with Engadget. "By taking a more long-term, ecosystem perspective as a device manufacturer we believe we can help grow this network for application developers which in turn would benefit everyone using Bitcoin. There's a sense of being my brother's keeper here for running a full node."

Although a full bitcoin ledger requires 200 GB of storage space, HTC is looking to run a compressed version on the phone itself, but the process will still require the full ledger stored on a microSD card. While this will undoubtedly impact on the phone’s performance when using it as a daily driver, it seems plausible enough that user’s might plug their device in and run the full node when they are not using it, like overnight for example. Expect to see the new Exodus 1s turning up towards the end of Q3.