Lenovo smartphones designed by Ashton Kutcher are coming this year

Ashton Kutcher is helping Lenovo design a line of special edition smartphones. The Hollywood star and noted tech enthusiast was brought on board as a product engineer back in October, and you’ll see the first devices influenced by Kutcher arrive sometime this year. According to Lenovo executive David Roman, Kutcher’s role in shaping the company’s hardware is very real. “I know on one level, it sounds corny,” Roman said in an interview with Recode. But he insisted that Lenovo’s partnership with Kutcher represents far more than a publicity grab. “He not only sees himself as an engineer, but he is an engineer. If he sees a problem, he wants to solve it.”

Roman said that Kutcher’s primary focus has revolved around user experience on the upcoming phones. It should be interesting to see how Kutcher — who has pumped venture capital funding into popular apps like Uber, Path, Airbnb, and Foursquare — makes his mark on mobile. Special edition projects aside, Lenovo is currently in the process of purchasing Motorola Mobility from Google, so the company’s smartphone push will only grow more aggressive in the months to come.