Telstra looking at HTC Android Phone?

HTC, the company that made the G1 phone for T-Mobile, reportedly is working on a new Android-based touch-screen phone for Telstra.

The gadget-focused Smarthouse wrote on Monday it heard that word from a senior Telstra executive at the just-ended Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas:

The new touch phone has been developed using a combination of the Google Android operating system and Linux based software written by HTC. The screen is believed to be bigger than current offerings from HTC.

Apparently, Telstra--and other Australian phone companies--aren't showing much interest in what's likely to be the country's first Android phone, the Kogan Agora. The Agora is scheduled to ship to buyers on January 29. Im still trying to get my hands on a pre-release version but without much luck so far.

Telstra seems inclined to hedge its bets on Android gadgets. In November, Telstra CEO Sol Trujillo--in the company of Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer--was somewhat dismissive of Google's phone technology: "My view is, (Android is) interesting, not compelling," Trujillo said. He also wondered aloud whether Google could follow through. "First generation, you make the sale. The question is when you get into the second, third, and fourth generation(s)," he said at the time.