HTC hopes Google will select them to develop Jelly Bean powered Nexus phone

It’s been over two years since HTC partnered with Google to develop the original Nexus One. While Samsung has been able to secure the contract with Google to build the past two Nexus devices, HTC is in talks with Google, hoping to be selected for the next Nexus phone which should be running on Android 5.0 (Jelly Bean). The official launch date of the device and the actual name and number of the next version of Android are still a mystery, but we do expect Google to give us a sneak peek of OS update at I/O later this spring.
Jeff Gordon from HTC was the one who mentioned HTC’s plans during an interview with Tech Radar at Mobile World Congress earlier this week. After being online for only a few hours, the original story was removed form the site. Once it came back online, the title of the article had changed and quotes from Jeff Gordon were no longer present, but we were lucky enough to have grabbed on for before it vanished.

Google hasn’t chosen its Nexus partner for (Android) Jellybean as yet. So right now all the manufacturers are crossing their fingers.

While securing the Nexus contract is important for HTC, Jeff stated that HTC is putting a huge focus on updating their current handsets to Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) which will be accompanied by an HTC Sense 3.6 upgrade which was developed to work specifically with ICS. No details were given as to why older phones would not be updated to HTC Sense 4.0, though it could have a lot to do with the hardware since HTC Image Sense and other features rely heavily on the latest hardware including in the HTC One series.

Update: It turns out that the original Tech Radar post may have misrepresented Jeff’s quotes a little. We’ve been in contact with Jeff and he states that he is not currently aware of any talks between HTC and Google regarding the next Nexus phone. We’re sure HTC wouldn’t mind making another Nexus phone, but for now there’s no real evidence to show that HTC is next in line.