Google employees “dogfooding” the new Google phone

The big news this weekend is that some Google employees are testing out the new Google phone rumoured to be appearing on the market in 2010.  Google has aptly named their internal testing process: ‘dogfooding.’ The employees will be testing the living daylights out of this over the Christmas period – luck beggars.

Here’s the official release:

At Google, we are constantly experimenting with new products and technologies, and often ask employees to test these products for quick feedback and suggestions for improvements in a process we call dogfooding (from “eating your own dogfood”). Well this holiday season, we are taking dogfooding to a new level.

We recently came up with the concept of a mobile lab, which is a device that combines innovative hardware from a partner with software that runs on Android to experiment with new mobile features and capabilities, and we shared this device with Google employees across the globe. This means they get to test out a new technology and help improve it.

Unfortunately, because dogfooding is a process exclusively for Google employees, we cannot share specific product details. We hope to share more after our dogfood diet.

- Mario Queiroz, Vice President, Product Management

Rumors are that this is the same HTC Dragon (Passion) that has been spotted a few times over the past few months.  Keep your eyes open on Monday for the internet to be bombarded with pictures.