Another look at Project Ara, the team behind it, and its speedy development process [VIDEO]

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Another look at Project Ara, the team behind it, and its speedy development process [VIDEO]

It’s probably one of the most interesting projects in mobile at the moment and one that gives us goosebumps every time we see its name come across our feed: Project Ara. A modular smartphone project, Ara sets to create a smartphone that essentially allows consumers to build (and upgrade) their own custom smartphones, similar to what we saw in the PC industry with desktop towers. Just smaller. Much smaller.

With the Project Ara Developer Conference kicking off today (you can watch it live here), the folks at The Verge were able to catch up with Paul Eremenko, the man currently heading the project.  The video, uploaded to YouTube earlier a few hours ago, dives into the folks behind Project Ara — Google’s Advanced Technology and Products (ATAP) group — who are on a fast track to creating a smartphone for the everyday-man.

Google’s ATAP team is small and “lean,” composed of engineers who originally worked at DARPA and have set an aggressive time schedule to launch a real, fully functional consumer-ready product early next year. Eremenko says that their self-imposed time pressure yields higher quality innovation with little risk aversion. ATAP’s goal is to create something more than a prototype, and is the reason we’re seeing Project Ara come to fruition in such a short amount of time (2 years). You owe it to yourself to watch the video and learn more about Project Ara.

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Newly leaked LG Isai could hint to the LG G3′s upcoming design

In the wee hours of last night, @evleaks dropped a nice little leak for us to drool over. What you’re looking at is what Mr. Leaks claims to be the upcoming LG Isai FL, a phone that is sure to make the bezel-hating crowd scream in glee. But not so fast — this model is only for Japanese carrier “au” by KDDI.

While it’s rare to see a Japanese smartphone make its way to other parts of the globe, it’s entirely possible we’re simply looking at the Japanese variant of the rumored LG G3. You’ll notice what appears to be LG’s trademark rear button placement which is  found on the LG G2 and the LG G2 Mini (and the LG G Flex), and given last year’s Isai (L22) was the G2, it’s likely the above pictured L24 is the G3. Really, we can only speculate at this point.

Last year’s Isai (left) compared with the LG G2 (right)

Given the LG G2 already had some of the smallest bezels on the market, LG really only has themselves to 1-up. With a rumored 2K display and Snapdragon 801 processor — would the Isai design make a worthy upgrade to last year’s LG G2?

[Google+ | via BGR | Image credit: DroidSans]

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