New York: Palm Inc has launched its smallest smartphone, making its initial entry into the low end phone market in a bid to perk up growth plans, and provide a cheesier option to Apple Inc’s iPhone.

For its new “Centro,” a smaller and lighter edition of its Treo smartphone, Palm has determined the price of just $100 to attract more and more customers. Sprint Nextel Corp will sell ‘Centro’ for the rest of the year in the United States.

The Centro weighs just 4.2 ounces and is fairly larger than a credit card. Its main features include a full keyboard, touch screen, and the capacity to read and send e-mail or manage documents and spreadsheets.

Palm officers said that the Centro is aimed at customary mobile phone users who want a more cogent device at a reasonable cost. The Treo tends to cost around $300 and more, and struggles with higher-priced, business-focused models including Research in Motion Ltd’s BlackBerry.

While addressing a press event in New York, Ed Colligan, chief excutive of Palm, said, “It has crossed into (the) feature phone market, which is 10 times the size of us just competing with RIM head-to-head, or us going after the iPhone.”

Mr. Colligan refused to declare which other carriers might sell this new smart phone after completion of Sprint’s 90-day exclusivity period.

Apple has an exclusive multiyear iPhone agreement with AT&T in the United States.

Michael Gartenberg, Jupiter Research analyst stated that the Centro is not mainly trendy or fresh, but the majority of phone buyers searching multimedia and business applications at cheap rates may follow their wallets.

“You may very well have some iPhone buyers who say 'I love the concept and the phone, but $399 is out of my price point. But $99, I can afford,” Mr. Gartenberg added.