Industry sources recently revealed Chinese internet company Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) and Taiwanese electronics manufacturer Foxconn (2038.HK; 2354.TW) will jointly launch a smartphone. Foxconn will produce the handset while Baidu will provide a cloud-based operating system. Sources close to Foxconn revealed that the smartphone has a 3.5-inch touch screen and a 1400mAh battery. Baidu's OS will offer cloud services, "box computing," online music platform Baidu Ting, and maps among other applications. Baidu refused to comment on the news.

The current cooperation is similar to Baidu's previous cooperation with Dell. At the end of 2011, Baidu and Dell released a smartphone, with Dell responsible for hardware and production, and Baidu responsible for application software. Baidu and Dell plan on sharing revenues from Baidu's built-in services such as search.