UK's INQ Mobile planning Twitter phone

Reuters is reporting that INQ Mobile plans to launch a mass market phone that would include a Twitter client, hoping to capitalize on the success of the micro-blogging service in time for the holiday sales season.

The phone would cost operators less than $140 and would save consumers money by utilizing a data connection to send messages over the Internet as opposed to using Twitter's SMS system.

INQ currently sells handsets based around social networking services like Facebook, Windows Live Messenger, Skype, and Last.FM. Since introducing a phone in 2007 with Skype support, the company has sold 700,000 handsets.