Cellular South will launch the HTC Merge next month, preloaded with Amazon Appstore

The HTC Merge is slowly making its way to US carriers. While Verizon probably won't launch it, it is headed to Alltel, which has already started taking pre-orders for it. And today Cellular South has announced that it too will sell the HTC Merge.

This won't be the first Android-powered smartphone in Cellular South's portfolio, but it will be the first Android-based ‘world phone' to be sold by the regional carrier. The HTC Merge will be available from Cellular South at some point during next month.

The interesting tidbit here is that Cellular South's HTC Merge will come with the Amazon Appstore preinstalled. In fact, this will be the first time that a new Android device ships with that particular app marketplace on it. It will be interesting to see if that influences the device's sales in any way – and if it will have any notable impact on Amazon's app sales.

Pricing for Cellular South's HTC Merge hasn't been announced yet, but you will need to sign a two-year contract when you get it, and you'll also have to get a data plan.

The HTC Merge has a 3.8-inch capacitive touchscreen, a 5 MP camera with autofocus, LED flash, and 720p HD video recording, Wi-Fi, GPS, and a full slide-out QWERTY keyboard.

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