Sony countdown timer points to a new Xperia device this month

Sony Mobile Communications, which less than four months ago was known as Sony Ericsson, hasn’t exactly had an exciting 2012. Their new lineup consists of devices that were clearly designed before the merger was complete, and worst of all their portfolio utilizes chips that were meant to be put into 2011 smartphones, not 2012 flagships. Seriously, how do these guys expect us to love their latest high end phone if it has a Qualcomm Snapdragon S3 inside? Anyway, the company has just put up a countdown timer that says they’re going to announce something later this month. In fact, we should be hearing about this mystery product less than a week before Google I/O kicks off, which is a guaranteed way of making sure the public immediately forgets about whatever you have to unveil.

So what do we want to see Sony do? It’s easy, they should just bring their Japanese phones to the rest of the world. The Xperia GX and SX are proper hero devices with brand spanking new S4 Snapdragons inside. Starting with the GX, it has a 4.6 inch 720p display and a 13 megapixel camera. Then there’s the SX, which has a smaller 3.7 inch screen that pushes 960 x 540 pixels; it has an 8 megapixel camera. Both these phones are like the Galaxy Nexus in that they don’t have any front facing buttons. And unlike the phones that Sony announced at Mobile World Congress, the GX and SX will ship with Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich on board.

Can Sony become a serious contender? If they put their mind to it, why not? We love Sony’s design department. They make gorgeous looking televisions, laptops, and the PDAs they made a decade ago were total sex objects. We hope the company is wise enough to apply some of that industrial design talent to what’s arguably the most important market going forward.