Ever had a dead car battery, reach for your cellphone to call for help, and find that your cellphone’s battery is dead, too? If you kept a SpareOne cellphone in your car or purse for emergencies, you wouldn’t have to worry about that scenario. The SpareOne is a Dual band GSM phone with patented technology that allows it to be powered by a single alkaline, NiMH, or lithium AA battery – the most widely-available battery. When powered with an Energizer Ultimate Lithium AA battery (included), you’ll have 10 hours of talk time, and it can keep its charge up to 15 years when unused. The SpareOne is a very reliable phone to leave in your car for emergencies and as a means of keeping in touch with your children or older relatives. SpareOne, equipped with an Energizer Ultimate Lithium battery and a micro SIM card, will be available in Q1 2012 in the US for $49.99. Different versions (US, Europe, and Asia) will be available with WCDMA frequency options for selected regions. It will also soon be available in customizable versions for businesses, events, and other uses.
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The problem with this would be you’ll still have to join some sort of monthly plan to keep the phone active with minutes. This might be better suited for Asian countries where you can always pick up a spare sim card with non-expiring minutes. I don’t think this would work well in corporate America.
As an “emergency only” phone it would work great, all US carriers support 911 (emergency) calls by law. Not necessarily a “keep in touch with the kids” type of service, but a good “my car just drove down an embankment with me in it” type of service.
Interesting idea. I take it there is no actual screen? In a natural disaster I think cell towers go down not just the phones so I’m not so sure how much advantage this phone offers. For $49.99 you can probably get a cheap phone anyway. How standard are micro-sims ? In Australia they are still unusual.
Sounds nice – but … does anyone know a single AA battery in the world that is guaranteed for 10 years? No? Well …
@Uli – I think Sanyo’s Eneloop batteries have an extremely long shelf-life.
@Michael – Micro-sims aren’t common here in the states yet. Still only in Apple’s iDevices and a few other tablets. Telstra still hasn’t shift to micro-sims yet?
I do. Energizer Ultimate Lithium (previously known as E2) are guaranteed for that, and I’ve got ones which have been in lights for five years now which work fine. Ditto CR123’s, which are rated to last that long, and which I’ve used from packs that had been lying around for four-to-five years without issue.
SIM’s can be cut down to micro SIM. So you could always get a pre-paid card and adjust it for use. While it’s still hard to find per usage service. Many only start the clock from the first time of use.
Or you can make the adjustment to your regular SIM or get a micro SIM from your provider and use a micro SIM to SIM adapter and if your phone ever breaks you can just move the card to this emergency phone until you can replace your main phone.
@Jackie Cheng. Yes you can get them but your standard $2 prepaid SIM from the petrol (gas) station is a normal SIM size. James’ idea would be sensible. Cut your sim down now and put it back in your phone using an adapter so it’s ready if you want to stick it in this phone. You can get punches that you can use to punch out a micro-sim from a standard sim if you don’t to do it by hand.
It should be solar-powered. That would make the SpareOne the definitive emergency-phone.