Ex-Apple John Sculley unveils Obi Worldphones, two attractive and affordable Android devices

Obi Worldphones — a company co-founded by former Apple CEO John Sculley — has unveiled its first two affordable and aesthetically striking smartphones. Both phones are named after California cities: SF1 named after San Francisco and SJ1.5 named after San Jose and feature similar designs, although there are clear differences in specifications and performance.

Obi Worldphones both combine an unusual flat edge on the top with rounded edges on the sides and at the bottom to make a phone which doesn’t quite look like anything else on the market. In some ways, the SF1 has an almost Lumia-esque look about it and has a raised display which reminds me a little of the OnePlus One. The SJ1.5 is a more colorful, and less premium-looking device.

Obi Worldphones Sf1

Running down the specs, the SF1 has a 5-inch, 1920×1080 resolution floating display coated in Gorilla Glass 4 to keep it protected. On the back, SF1 packs an impressive 13MP Sony Exmor RS camera sensor with automatic focus and a LED flash along with a 5MP front facing camera for “killer selfies”. Interestingly, the rear flash has a feature named ‘ChromaFlash’ to preserve color in photos to avoid having bright, white washed-out pics. It achieves this by taking two photos, one with flash, one without and combining the two images. You’ll be able to shoot in 1080p at 30 frames per second and take HDR photos.

The SF1 also features an impressive-sounding Dolby Audio Surround 7.1 feature when you have headphones plugged in. What’s more, there’s a 64-bit Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 processor coupled with either 16GB storage and 2GB RAM or 32GB storage and 3GB RAM, both models feature MicroSD support up to 64GB. Its 3,000mAh battery will easily keep it going all day, and will charge really quickly with Quick-Charge 1.0 support.

The SJ1.5 is Obi Worldphone‘s cheaper phone. It still has a 5-inch screen but has a 720×1280 resolution screen coated in Gorilla Glass 3. It has an 8MP camera with f/2.2 aperture and 1080p video on the back and a 5MP snapper on the front. Like the SF1, it has dual-SIM support and a 3,000mAh battery as well as expandable storage via MicroSD, but only up to 32GB. That’s alongside the 16GB internal storage and 1GB RAM. While the SF1 comes with a Snapdragon chip, the SJ1.5 has a a 1.3GHz MediaTek quad-core processor.

Obi Worldphones SJ1.5

Both phones run a custom version of Android 5.1 Lollipop. Dubbed Obi Lifespeed, it’s been designed to compliment the look and design of the devices, but also be quick and efficient. Pricing differs per model. The cheaper SJ1.5 will cost around $129, while the 16GB/2GB SF1 costs $199 and the 32GB/3GB SF1 is $249. The phones will go on sale in October in Vietnam, Thailand, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Pakistan, Turkey, India and the UAE.