Fujitsu Toshiba's Japanese version of the Mango smartphone. Photo from ppcgeeks.com

Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS rule the handset market here in China, but Microsoft is gearing up to storm into what will surely become the world’s largest market for smartphones with its new Mango operating system.

Essentially an update of the Windows 7 operating system, Mango puts the focus squarely on functional integration – users will be able to e-mail, text, share photos and update their social networks (i.e. Facebook, Twitter, Weibo and the like) from the central “Me Hub,” rather than separate functions apps – an idea that extends to the entire platform.

According to Bench3.com: “Mango seeks to seamlessly integrate into one app what used to take two or three apps. Imagine searching for a nearby shopping mall in your maps app and being able to view a interior map of the mall and get a pop-up directory of stores all in one.”

Other features include an enhanced search function (via photos and even barcodes) with a display of highly practical results – for example, a search for a movie will reveal screening locations, showtimes, ticket prices, plot summary, photos of the movie etc. in a single location – and “app shortcutting,” which allows users to access specific functions in an app (i.e. the ticket booking function in a travel app). Add in other goodies like speech recognition (á la Apple’s Siri), hands-free texting, unified cloud storage and synchronization, video Skype (which is now owned by Microsoft) and Xbox integration and you’ve got what appears to be a seriously powerful platform.

First generation Mango handsets were rolled out earlier this month in the US, Japan and India, with plans to launch Mango-based Nokia, Samsung and HTC phones soon (the Taiwan-based HTC will launch its “Titan” and “Radar” phones next week).

China, for now, will have to wait: Andrew Lee, President of Microsoft’s Windows Phone Division, announced in a forum interview in yesterday that Mango-based smartphones will launch on a “large scale” in China next year, but did not reveal any specific date or specific manufacturing partners, merely emphasizing Microsoft’s close partnership with the recently acquired Nokia (which remains China’s largest cell phone supplier).

The timing of the release (in between iPhone releases) and prospects look good for the Chinese version of the Mango phone, which purportedly will be able to integrate with all of the major domestic social media platforms and use them to create a contact lists that generate profiles for each along with their latest photos and status updates. Apple and Google would be well advised to prepare for an expanded Battle Royale in the worldwide smartphone wars.

by Ophelia Ren and Jerry Chan