Puma, in partnership with European mobile manufacturer Sagem, has announced the Puma Phone which will be running their proprietary Puma OS.

As expected from Puma, there are many features for the sporty types that you normally wouldn't find on smartphones, such as a pedometer, as well as built-in bike/running applications, among a few others.

What really sets it apart from anything else is the solar panel on its back, allowing you to charge your phone wherever you are. As you charge the phone with the sun, you'll be able to collect points which you can spend in the Puma store. You'll also be able to keep count of how many messages, minutes of music, and talk time are available from charging it in the sun. Moreover, the music player comes in the form of a turntable which actually lets you do some scratching. Check out the hands-on video below from Recombu:

It is obvious that a lot of thought has been put into the device's software design and appearance. It's specs are pretty decent too - it won't be able to compete with the top tier smartphones but as a "lifestyle device", it'll be more than enough.

Device specifications

• Integrated solar cell, with charge indicator
• Touchscreen: 2.8 inch thumbable screen with 240 x 320 QVGA resolution and TFT wide viewing angle
• Camera: 3.2 megapixel camera with LED flash and x6 zoom; Bluetooth photo sharing
• Video: VGA video call camera; full screen video playback, with video recording and streaming and progressive video download
• Music: wide range of music formats with playlist support and FM radio
• Localisation: GPS, compass, geotagging, routing and mapping
• Sports: pedometer, GPS tracker and stopwatch
• Internet: Open internet browsing, with WAP Push
• Messaging: Mobile email client and mobile web mail notification; instant messaging; MMS and SMS
• HSPA and W-CDMA/EDGE/GPRS/GSM connectivity; Bluetooth; USB 2.0
• Talk time up to 5 hours with 350 hours stand-by time; video call time 140 minutes; music player time 24 hours; video player time 5 hours
• Tablet form factor; 115g weight and dimensions of 102mm x 56mm x 13mm

The Puma Phone will be released in through various mobile network operators across greater Europe as well as via Puma's online store on April 3, 2010, with international markets following.

[Puma Phone]