14 DAY TRIAL // Wireless carrier Sprint announced on Thursday the release of a new mobile phone, the eco-friendly Samsung Reclaim. The new handset has been built using bio-plastic materials, 80 percent of which are recyclable. Even so, the device comes to the market as a feature-rich messaging phone capable of delivering great functionality to environmentally conscious customers.
The Samsung Reclaim will become available for purchase on August 16, the carrier announced, and subscribers will be able to acquire it from all Sprint retail channels, including Best Buy or Radio Shack, as well as from Sprint telesales and from the company's website. The price of the new phone has been set at $49.99 upon the signing of a two-year service agreement and after a $30 instant rebate and a $50 mail-in rebate. In addition, it will also become available via Wal-Mart starting with early September.
The new Samsung handset comes towards Sprint's users in a sliding form factor and sports a full QWERTY keyboard. According to the wireless carrier, $2 from the cost of the device will go to The Nature Conservancy’s Adopt an Acre program, which is targeted at the conservation of land in the US and at the protection of natural habitats.
“This generous donation from Sprint will help us protect and restore some of America’s most beautiful and ecologically-important landscapes for future generations to enjoy,” said Mark Tercek, president and CEO of The Nature Conservancy. “We applaud Sprint’s sustainability efforts, as innovation and new technology are crucial to the future of conservation.”
When it comes to the eco-friendliness of Reclaim, we can count environmentally responsible components, a fully recyclable packaging, the use of bio-plastic material made from corn, soy-based ink used for the printing of images and text on the box as well as of phone warranty information, or an Energy Star-approved charger. In addition, the paper user manual has been replaced with a virtual manual that can be accessed on Sprint's website, here.
The specification list of the phone shows a slide-out full QWERTY keyboard, a 2-megapixel photo snapper with video recording capabilities, stereo Bluetooth 2.0, Sprint Navigation with Search, Sprint’s One Click UI with fast access to social networks like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and YouTube, and an integrated Web browser (WAP). Moreover, the phone also comes with a memory card slot that provides support for up to 32GB of additional storage space, and comes in two different color versions, Earth Green and Ocean Blue.