Aimed at industrial and commercial customers, the Motorola E400 Enterprise Digital Assistant (EDA) is a very different type of smartphone from the ones most people are used to.

Featuring a 3" 480 x 640 pixel display, Windows Mobile 6.5.3 and connectivity with WiFi, GSM/UMTS and CDMA/EVDO networks, the Motorola ES400 is also impressively rugged and is certified to US standard MIL-STD 810G.
Motorola will sell the ES400 later this year through specialist distribution partners as well as the Sprint network in the US. The presence of an optional French AZERTY and German QWERTZ keyboards in addition to the English QWERTY layout hint at availability in Europe as well.
Windows Mobile 6.5 is hardly a sexy operating system
, but it is the kind of thing that many enterprise customers actually use. It features a variety of applications
including a web browser, corporate email support and a cut-down version of Microsoft Office. Of interest is the fact that Microsoft have also announced a new OS called Windows Embedded Handheld, designed specifically for this type of enterprise device where the upcoming Windows Phone 7 would not be suitable.

The ES400 is a hefty piece of kit, weighing in at 156 grams and measuring 129 x 60 x 17mm with the standard battery. There's an extended battery too, bringing the unit up to 189 grams and adding 5mm in thickness. Part of this size and weight is down to the ES400's ruggedness - the handset can survive a 3 foot drop onto a hard floor, and is resistant to rain, vibration, thermal shock and high altitudes.

 

While we are on the subject of batteries, the standard one is a 1540 mAh cell that provides up to 6 hours talktime and 10 days standby time, the extended cell is a huge 3080 mAh cell that doubles the ES400's battery life.
On the front is a 3" 480 x 640 pixel touch sensitive display with haptic feedback, and it's worth noting that the ES400 comes with a stylus for more accurate input than finger-based touchscreens. Motorola say that the display is exceptionally bright, enabling it to be used with ease outdoors when other smartphones would struggle.
The QWERTY keyboard on the front is a conventional layout, and it should present few problems to users. Turn the phone around and there's a 3.2 megapixel autofocus camera which is capable of scanning 1D and 2D barcodes.
Other features include GPS, an integrated fingerprint reader, Bluetooth and USB connectivity. The Motorola ES400 also supports 802.11a, b and g WiFi, quad-band GSM, UMTS 850 / 1900 / 2100 plus HSPA high-speed data and also CDMA/EVDO 850 / 1900 MHz, which means that it can work just about anywhere indoors or outdoors.

 

It's not likely to be cheap - the rival Psion Teklogix iKôn retails for about €1500 - but functionality is always going to be more important than price to the customers who buy this, and the ES400 is certainly a powerful device.
There's no exact word on availability, except that the ES400 should be available sometime this year.