India’s booming mobile market is seen as a highly lucrative field for many companies, and Samsung is one of them, as well. While a plethora of affordable Android devices are being announced, Samsung thinks it could stand apart with its own, Tizen OS software.

Earlier this week, a new report was published by the Wall Street Journal, saying that Samsung will launch a cheap Tizen-based smartphone for Indian customers next week. The publication says that it will be quite affordable, retailing for a price of under $100.

The WSJ cites South Korea’s Maeil Business Newspaper who said Samsung will hold a press conference on December 10 to launch its first Tizen smartphone, the Z1. While Samsung declined to comment, this makes sense, since there’s been a lot of talk recently with regards to its Tizen software.

Samsung initially planned to launch a Tizen smartphone in Russia in the third quarter, but it seems that the ecosystem wasn’t yet ready. However, recently, the company has announced Tizen-based Samsung Gear S smartwatch for Indian customers. And now it seems that they could be getting the very first Tizen phone, as well.

With Tizen, Samsung tries to reduce its dependence on Google, but the company will still have to face the big problem of lack of apps made for Tizen. A potential solution would be for the smartphone to be able to run Android apps, as well, but that wouldn’t help with what the South-Korean company is trying to achieve.

The Samsung Z1 is expected to have a TFT LCD display with at 800x480p resolution, being powered by a 1.2 GHz dual core Spreadtrum SC7727S CPU along with 512 MB of on-board memory. There will be a 3.2 MP shooter at the back and that’s about what we know so far. We’ll be keeping our ears to the ground in case new information breaks out.

READ ALSO: