Remember the iPhone? You know, the other one?

On December 18 last year, Linksys announced a family of cordless phones called the iPhone that connect to VOIP services like Skype over a Wi-Fi connection.

Even though it may seem like Linksys' iPhones died quiet and unmourned deaths, they're still on the market. Linksys is even planning to release new products under the iPhone brand in 2008. But don't get too excited: Linksys won't say what they are.

"Linksys doesn't disclose products that haven't been released," said Karen Sohl, a spokesperson for the company, "but we'll continue to release products under the iPhone name."

When Linksys announced the Skype-enabled Wi-Fi handset in December 2006, few remembered that parent company Cisco had snapped up the trademark with the 2001 acquisition of Infogear. When Apple used the same name a few months later, it led to a legal dispute, which was swiftly settled.

Almost a year has passed since the original announcement, however, and both companies appear quite happy to share the brand. Apple's iPhone is the gadget-success story of the year, marching toward 3.5 million sales by the new year, according to estimates by investment bank Piper Jaffray. While Linksys declined to disclose sales, none of its iPhones are contenders in Amazon's best-selling electronics category. The best showing is from the CIT400 model, sitting at rank 742 overall.

Relations with Apple, Sohl said, are good. "There's no bad blood," she said. "We enjoy working with Apple."

With Linksys' clear claim to the name, many were surprised to see Apple CEO Steve Jobs call his company's handset "iPhone," even though the press, bloggers and public had called Apple's handset that all along. Cisco filed a lawsuit almost immediately.

The two companies settled their differences on February 20, agreeing to share the mark. The terms of the agreement were never disclosed but it included language about "interopability." A year on, there's no sign of interoperability between the two ranges. Apple has yet to outline any official VOIP capabilities for the iPhone, and Linksys had little to say about the issue.

"It's ongoing," Sohl said. "We're looking at having interoperability, but no details of the specifics have been announced yet."

Despite the low profile, Linksys' iPhone models have received decidedly favorable reviews.

Linksys' iPhone products are marketed as "a new age of communications," and actually have a high-tech edge shared by few rival products.

The lineup of Wi-Fi handsets, which connect to popular VOIP networks such as Skype and Yahoo Messenger, also include the ability to tap into personal media on local networks – photos, music and video.

Cisco acquired the iPhone trademark in 2000. Infogear sold the original iPhone, a combined phone and web-access device, from 1998. Though novel, featuring a QWERTY keyboard and an LCD touch screen, it was discontinued in 2001. Its trademark application was filed in 1996. Apple applied for trademarks on the name in October 2002, but only Australia and Singapore assigned it. A Canadian company, Comware, has marketed its own VOIP devices using the iPhone name since 2004.

It's a legal mess that extends to the marketplace. Mike Olson, an analyst with Piper Jaffray said trying to latch its VOIP lineup to the iPhone brand makes it hard for Linksys' products to forge their own identity.

"It serves only to confuse people," he said. "When you're building a category around technology that consumers don't fully understand, like VOIP, naming a product after something hugely successful in another category will only confuse people further."

"No one equates Linksys with iPhone, and they never did," Olson continued. "This was true even when Linksys was the only company out with an iPhone. It comes down to wanting to be involved, somehow, with the juggernaut."