Android Father Andy Rubin Teases May 30 Launch For ‘Essential’ Smartphone With 360-Degree Camera Add-On

Once again, Andy Rubin, the co-creator of Android and former boss of Google's Android division has taken to Twitter in order to tease a smartphone being developed at Essential, a new company he started last year. Essential joined Twitter in November 2016 and has just two tweets, both of which were posted in the past 24 hours "to let you know something big is coming May 30th."
The most recent tweet shows a darkened image of a smartphone with an odd protrusion at the top. While Rubin did not offer up any clues as to what that might be, the consensus on the web is that it is a 360-degree camera attachment. This is reinforced by a bit of photo editing by the folks at Engadget. Check it out:


Rumor has it that Rubin's phone will be somewhat modular, giving users the ability to attach different accessories using magnetic pins. A 360-degree camera looks to be one of them, though we would not be surprised to see other add-ons made available similar to what can be found for the Moto Z, such as different types of camera lenses, projectors, external speakers, and so forth.


Further evidence of the 360-degree camera module is supported by another recent tweet by Rubin himself, of an Essential engineer clearly viewing wide-angle or fish-eye view images stitched together on a workstation. However, when Rubin first announced he was starting a new company, he talked of plans to release a high-end smartphone infused to the core with artificial intelligence. He also said it would feature a large edge-to-edge display before teasing out an image a couple of months ago. Things seem to have expanded beyond that vision as well, apparently. 

Beyond those minimal details, nothing else has been confirmed about the mystery handset. However, it appears as though all will be revealed next week just ahead of Computex.