Would an Asus PadFone with Windows Phone 8 make sense?

The latest tech gossip from the Wall states that Taiwanese PC manufacturer Asus is in talks with Microsoft for developing a Windows Phone 8 device. Asus has had its share of experience with Android from handsets like the PadFone and the PadFone 2 and it seems it is exploring other platforms as well. Asus already has a long line of Windows 8 notebooks and hybrids, so attempting a phone with the same OS is not a very far-fetched idea. Considering the fact that mobile phone shipments rose by 45 percent last year while PC adoption was down 3.2 percent, it makes sense for the company to tap into the mobile space and having devices on multiple platforms gives better market penetration as well.

With Windows Phone 8

Let’s say, we do get a Windows Phone 8 handset from Asus, would it make sense to go down the PadFone route or simply leave it as a standalone handset? If Asus choose the latter option, then it better have something truly unique to offer in terms of design or features, as it’ll be competing with the heavyweights like Samsung, Nokia and HTC who’ve already made their name in the Windows Phone arena. On the other hand, the trend of hybrid devices is catching on like wild fire and Asus could be tempted to pull off a PadFone type device to offer you functionality of a mobile phone and tablet/notebook experience. Except, will it be the same as using an actual hybrid running Windows 8? Probably not, and here’s why. Just like the Android running PadFone, the apps for Windows Phone 8 and Windows 8 Store will be different. So even when you dock your phone in to go from smartphone mode to tablet mode,  you’ll still be accessing the Windows Phone 8 store and not the Windows 8 store, thereby limiting you to the type of apps you’ll be able to use. Also, we’ve not seen how Windows Phone 8 will look like on a larger screen. There will have to be a lot of tweaking involved as the live tiles will have to be rendered in landscape mode instead of portrait and we’ve not see if that’s possible yet.

The idea of such a device does sound very appealing, but we’ve yet to see how Asus pulls it off, if there is such a device in the first place.