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Micromax’s director Vikas Jain saw a queue of villagers next to a man with car battery fastened to his bicycle at an Indian village in 2007. The village didn't have electricity and they were paying him a small amount to charge their mobile phones for thirty minutes at a time. This inspired Micromax to build its first cell phone, the X1i, with an oversized battery that lasts for 30 days. The phone was a massive hit in India. Now Shenzhen’s own Umeox is trying to revolutionize the mobile arena by tossing away electricity for sunlight.
With all this in mind, Umeox came up with this green idea of harnessing solar energy to pump up smartphone juice. I would have doubted the viability of a solar battery charging panel in a smartphone; green energy is oft spoken about, but seldom practiced. The growing acceptance of solar charging accessories; however, has brought a lot of attention to the idea of having an embedded solar charging panel on handsets. 
Dutch company Intivation has expertise in solar energy microprocessors, but until recently, their partners have had to find their own panel suppliers. To improve this scenario, Intivation introduced a new product called Sunboost3, an all-in-one solar module. Umeox has used Intivation’s Sunboost3 all-in-one solar module to create an in-built solar charging panel, which can be fixed on the back of a cell phone, constantly charging the battery even in low light conditions.
The Umeox Apollo, the first solar powered Android smartphone, was shown off at the Mobile World Congress. It weighs only 100g and is 110x57x15mm with the built-in charging panel covering an area of 24 square cm. It needs to be charged via the sun for around 2-3 hours a day for the battery to last for the entire day. If the phone battery dies out completely then it takes up to 17 hours of sun bathing to charge it fully again.
The Apollo isn’t a plain green, bland phone but a 3.2-inch touchscreen with 320x480 resolution, 3MP camera on the back, 1GB of storage, a MicroSD card slot, FM radio, Bluetooth 2.1 with A2DP connectivity and 3.5mm audio jack. Not a bad assortment for a budget price tag of USD 100. 
Android is brought to this solar wonder courtesy of MediaTek chips, and there will be two different models. The Europe-Asia version will have MediaTek’s MTK6516 chip to support 900/1800MHz frequency bands and will hit the stores in the second quarter of 2011. The US version will arrive a little later in the third quarter of 2011 with the MTK6516 chip and is rumored to support 900/1800MHz bands under the AT&T network.
Ideal for environmental enthusiasts, frequent travelers, campers and hikers, but its greatest popularity would be in developing and under-developed countries. Even more than the North American or European countries where launches have been announced, a solar charging phone like the Apollo will appeal in the least connected areas of the world like the African countries, Central and East Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. It’s not just calling and texting features, but the fact that it’s a low cost smartphone that can boost the reach of the Internet in these places.
These countries constitute a major section of the world’s population, where populations can be remotely located, lack basic amenities such as electricity, or that suffer with power problems. All these places have something in common; they are all brightly sunlit places where sunlight is in abundance for the entire day. The Umeox Apollo is ideal for these locations, costing only a little, needing no power output for charging.
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