Phone
Several manufacturers have made “green” phones, but they have generally been bare-bones devices, like Motorola Inc.s Renew, carried by T-Mobile USA. Nokia Corp.s Evolve is also a simple, low-end phone and lacks the backing of a U.S. carrier.
The new Samsung Reclaim is a more fully featured phone, sporting a slide-out alphabetic keyboard, e-mail and Web access, a camera and GPS navigation. The phone goes on sale Aug. 16.
The plastic of the casing is 40 percent corn-based. The phones charger lights up when the phone is fully charged, to remind the owner to unplug it to save electricity.
David Owens, Sprint Nextel Corp.s director of product marketing, said the company is paying more than the usual amount of subsidies to Samsung to bring the price down to $49.99 for customers signing two-year contracts.
“We took a big step to put it under the $50 price because thats where we know theres a lot of volume,” he said.
The price applies after a $50 mail-in rebate.