HTC had long known that the company should have its own brand; it was only a matter of time before the company began to move in that direction. When HTC made the first coloured screen smartphone for O2 in February 2002, O2 encouraged HTC to use its own brand but Chou did not think the timing was right. Although HTC had invested in Qtek in Europe in 2001, this line was only a small test of running a brand.The HTC management team carefully evaluated the
branding decision for five years and the board of directors discussed it for three years. In the middle of its internal
deliberations over introducing its own brand, HTC established an R&D team in 2005 to develop a finger-optimized
touch-screen smartphone. This initiative was unknown to anyone outside the company.