Synapse-Phones is a now-defunct German start-up company that offered a customizable Android smartphones.[1] The company was headquartered in Braunschweig, Lower Saxony, Germany, and was founded in September 2010 by Christopher Brüning, Philipp Ziebart, and Eugen Bernhardt.[2]
Synapse-Phones gained online prominence[3] almost immediately with its offer of the Synapse One, an Android smartphone that had hardware which could be customized to suit each customer's needs.[4] According to the Synapse-Phones website, the phones could be enabled for WLAN, configured with a front camera, or set up for television feed or other multimedia. Customers could pick either capacitive or physical buttons, and even had a choice of color.[5][6]
On September 29, 2010, Synapse-Phones announced that customers could visit their website to preorder and customize their Android smartphones, and promised that the phones would ship by "the middle of Q1 2011."[7] The response was so overwhelming that Synapse-Phones' site crashed and visitors were redirected to the company blog.
The Synapse One failed to ship as promised. Synapse-Phones offered no explanation, but simply ceased operation in January 2011.