essential
Twitter / Essential

Amidst a cutthroat competition in the smartphone race is a new Android phone getting on its feet. Essential is the up and coming smartphone featuring a groundbreaking 360-degree camera, an innovation that targets industry leaders Apple and Samsung.

Essential phone

Essential's name has started to ring a bell in the mobile device department after founder Andy Rubin dropped the news that this soon-to-be-released Android phone is carrying a 360-degree camera, a feature that neither Apple nor Samsung was able to come up with their high-end iPhone and Galaxy devices. The 360-degree camera will be used for virtual and augmented reality purposes.

According to BGR, the images "seems to imply there's going to be some sort of connector placed on top of the phone to attach that camera".

On Thursday, the official Twitter account of Essential teased that something big is coming next week. A couple of hours later, it posted an image revealing a smartphone with an accessory on top which is clearly a camera. This will be unveiled on 30 May.

Back in March, Andy Rubin first tweeted his excitement through a photo of a hand holding what seemed to be a smartphone. And in April, he tweeted again an image of his colleague with caption soliciting for any guesses on the next project they are working on.

Rubin's flagship device has been considered by tech pundits as a contender in the making that Apple, Samsung, and other mobile phone manufacturers should watch out for.

But as of now, Rubin and his cohorts have not released other details yet other the impressive camera accessory. However, there have been reports already pointing out that Essential will sport an edge-to-edge display and another feature that the iPhone does not have yet.