Walmart helped spur Black Friday sales today by selling the HTC Droid Eris on discount. The Android smartphone has dropped from its original $100 to $30 on the same two-year contract as at Verizon. It doesn't require a rebate but is currently backordered.
Users of the Sony Aino smartphone in the UK are finding some problems when using the device's touchscreen interface, according to a Thursday report. Only a small numbers of the devices in Britain are affected, says Sony Ericsson spokesperson Mattias Holm, and the company is working on resolving the issue. Details of the problem have not been disclosed, however.
Carphone Warehouse today raised its profit estimates for its fiscal year based on the surprise success of its smartphone business (subscription required). Its earnings for its first fiscal half-year before tax and other factors jumped sharply from £65 million ($107.2 million) a year ago to £103 million ($169.9 million) and is attributed directly to the success of its smartphone sales, particularly touchscreen devices. Its sales of the iPhone were considered a strong factor, as were sales of BlackBerry devices and Nokia's Nseries.
What is believed to be the successor to the touchscreen-equipped LG Arena has been spotted (PDF) passing testing at the Wi-Fi Alliance. Little is known about the LG Arena Max LU9400, other than that it will have Wi-Fi capability. It will also presumably retain the touchscreen interface, though it isn't likely to have a smartphone-grade operating system such as Windows Mobile or Android.
Samsung's bada has received a definitive public debut date through an invitation sent to the press. The phone platform and its development kit should be given their first public airing at an event in London on December 8th. Besides showing the software, the gathering will also have Samsung discuss its future mobile strategy.
Microsoft's interim Windows Mobile update could have significant updates designed explicitly for touch, a pair of leaks show. A Microsoft representative seeking anonymity has claimed that previous shots of "6.5.1" are accurate but that it's not necessarily a straight patch. Instead, the larger, bottom-only buttons are meant to provide an alternative interface for capacitive touchscreens; the existing top-and-bottom split makes those items too small to hit with a finger, the employee told mopocket.
Chinese wireless provider China Unicom said on Friday it will bring out the Uphone, which will closely resemble competitor China Mobile's Ophone Android phone. The Uphone will get its own version of the Android OS, called UniPlus, as well as its own Uphone app store. The app store will likely open before the first handsets ship in order to give developers a head start on populating the virtual shelves with their wares. The announcement was made by China Unicom Chairman Chang Xiaobing.
Acer's mobile head Aymar de Lencquesaing said in an interview late Thursday that the company plans to shift its attention more towards Android and reduce its Windows Mobile effort. Although all of the company's 10 smartphones this year save for the Liquid A1 were running Windows Mobile, the executive promised Reuters that 2010 will be "much more balanced" and see significantly more Android phones among the 8 to 10 planned for the year.
Lenovo today said it would buy back Lenovo Mobile, its previously separate cellphone business. The deal, worth $200 million in cash and shares, brings back a division that the company had sold off just last year in a bid to save money. In justifying the reversal, the computer maker said that PCs are converging with smartphones and that there would be a "significant growth opportunity" to have a stake in handheld devices.
Nokia today said that the X6 Comes with Music edition is now shipping. The media phone is Nokia's most advanced to support the unlimited subscription service and, with 32GB of internal storage, could theoretically download and keep about 7,000 songs without paying extra beyond the price of the Comes with Music phone itself. The phone can as always either buy tracks through Nokia or sync with a Mac or PC.
As part of its Thanksgiving and Black Friday celebrations, wireless provider Verizon will offer the Gateway LT netbook for just $30 with a two-year data contract from Verizon. It represents a $70 in savings as the netbook is currently priced at $100. The netbook has a Wi-Fi connection and an embedded 3G module, along with a 10.1-inch screen, a 160 GB hard drive and 1GB of RAM.
AT&T dipped into Black Friday deals with word today of its Thanksgiving promo. The cell carrier promises unspecified deals on Friday itself starting from midnight but plans a major promo for each day of the weekend as well as Monday. Saturday will focus exclusively on BlackBerries and will give away the Curve 8310 or Pearl 8110 for free on a smartphone contract. Price drops are also due for the Curve 8320, which will cost $50, and the Curve 8900 at $100.
The European Parliament late yesterday officially approved a final key rule in its telecoms package that will require legal rights for those threatened with losing Internet access in piracy cases. The measure will only allow EU member states to cut off access if it's deemed "appropriate, proportionate and necessary within a democratic society." Any decision will require an objective procedure that allows the accused to defend themselves as well as presumptions of innocence and a right to privacy.
LG on Wednesday announced it will soon release a new Android phone exclusively sold through China Mobile, the GW880. Also known as the Amundsen, after South Pole explorer Roald Amundsen, the handset runs on China's TD-SCDMA network and sports a 3.5-inch, 800x480 touchscreen, along with a GPS receiver, Bluetooth, and a 5-megapixel camera.
The launch of the Motorola Droid and Verizon's ad campaign have pushed Motorola's brand loyalty for the first time in recent memory, YouGov reported in its BrandIndex late last week. The Android phone maker passed Apple one week ago and, as of Friday the 20th, had a loyalty score among men of 29.3. By comparison, Apple has fallen from a recent high of 48.1 on the 9th, shortly after the Droid launch, to 22 on the 20th.
Infineon today said it would work with Nokia to develop chipsets for 4G mobile Internet based on the Long Term Evolution (LTE) standard. The deal won't be exclusive and will primarily ensure that Infineon 4G hardware will support Nokia's technology licenses. The two hope to speed up development and make sure that 4G works properly across all devices, not just Nokia's.
The BlackBerry Curve line fended off the iPhone 3GS to claim the title of top-selling phone in the US, the NPD Group said this week. Without providing numbers, the analysts noted that RIM's basic QWERTY phone still outsold the high-end iPhone during the summer. The iPhone 3G reached third place and reflected its relatively low price.
LG's IQ smartphone, also known as the Monaco, has surfaced with a branding badge for the Canadian carrier Telus, according to images posted by the Mobile Ninjas. The handset reportedly features a Snapdragon processor, WVGA display, 5 megapixel camera, and a slide-out QWERTY keyboard. An optical trackpad is present to help users navigate the Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system, which appears to be paired with LG's S-class interface.
Wireless provider Verizon's requests to the National Advertising Division of the Council of Better Business Bureaus was heard and the national ad watchdog is now asking Sprint to cease calling itself "America's most dependable 3G network." According to a Tuesday report, the division argued independent tests performed by Nielsen Co. showed Verizon in fact suffers from fewer blocked or dropped calls than Sprint. In response, Sprint is asking the parties to consider test numbers from more than one source in order to help eliminate one-time events that include bad weather or bad cell towers.
A judge in the Canadian province of British Columbia has ruled in favor of Telus in a recent lawsuit filed against Rogers for inaccurate ad claims that said Rogers has Canada's most reliable wireless network. Telus argued that since it recently launched its own HSPA network along with Bell, it was on par with Rogers in terms of network reliability.
The designer XPERIA Pureness handset from Sony Ericsson will get a successor, according to the original's designer, Daniel Mauritzson. While the original's mission was to keep it simple, the Pureness 2 will be even more so, Mauritzson says. In his own words, the Pureness 2 will act as a "counterbalance" to smartphones.
LG recently announced it will soon release a special Christmas Edition of its already available BL40 New Chocolate handset in its home market of South Korea. The device will sport a special black case with golden accents and includes a voucher than can potentially win owners of the handset prizes valued at the equivalent of more than $4,000. The main other functional difference of the Christmas Edition phone compared to the original is its 8-megapixel camera versus a 5-megapixel shooter.
NewerTech has launched the NuPower Charge & Sync+, a pocket-sized charger. The unit can charge, power and sync iPhones and iPods, as well as simply charge and power USB-based cellphones, cameras and portable game consoles. It uses a rechargeable 1400mAh lithium-ion battery, and can charge both itself and another device when an AC connection is present.
Owners of Palm's newer phones have encountered a flaw in its online backup system that has wiped out contacts and calendars. A portion of users note that backups sent to Palm's Profile cloud service from a Pre (and now Pixi) are being corrupted and blank out any synchronized data when the phone has to be reset or restored. Those without a local backup, such as through an app like Missing Sync, have no choice but to recreate the data from scratch.
AT&T returned to carrying HP smartphones today through the iPAQ Glisten (link active soon). In addition to being HP's first Windows Mobile 6.5 device, it's also the first smartphone for AT&T and HP to include a relatively color rich AMOLED touchscreen. Similarly, it's one of the few anywhere to combine this with a fixed QWERTY keyboard and should be one of the most advanced candybar-design phones in the field.
Rogers this morning claimed the title of first North American carrier to pick up the Nokia N86 8MP. Already on display for a few days, the phone is one of the first more quality-focused camera phones and has a variable aperture and high shutter speed that often aren't included on phones. A flash, dedicated camera controls on the two-way slider and an OLED display help refine the final shot further still.
Nokia started off its Tuesday with two slider phones to spark life in its mid-range. The 6700 slide takes some styling cues from the iPod nano and comes in six solid aluminum colors. It's additionally a relatively high-end camera phone for the category and has a 5-megapixel sensor with Carl Zeiss optics and dual flashes.
Best Buy has posted its Black Friday specials online, confirming many of the prices and deals that were seen in a leaked flyer as well as some new doorbuster deals. The new deals include a Palm Pre handset priced at $80, matching a recent sale price at Amazon, as well as a 15.6-inch HP G60 notebook powered by a 2.2GHz Intel Celeron processor priced at $197. Unlike the other deals, the HP notebook is only available in store. The remaining deals are available online, starting on Thursday.
Symbian has been dealt setbacks in recent days as both Nokia's N97 and Sony Ericsson's Satio appear to have been pulled due to likely quality concerns. The former isn't available on most carriers and is now no longer selectable through Vodafone UK; while visible online, choosing it redirects shoppers to the N97 mini. No explanation has been given, but it's suspected that the more stable Symbian release on the smaller, newer phone is the cause while the original N97's initial firmware was the cause of numerous complaints.
Google co-creator Sergey Brin followed up the introduction of Chrome OS with hints that the new operating system may eventually merge with Android. While the two are currently separate in most ways, the executive suggested the two could unite simply because smartphones and notebooks increasingly share common traits. He pointed out that both have Linux at the root and WebKit for their browsing engines.
Spotify on Monday launched a Symbian app for its streaming music service. Nokia, Sony Ericsson and Samsung, among others, use the Symbian operating system in the majority of their devices, potentially opening up the service to millions of new users. Spotify Mobile is already offered for the iPhone and for Android handsets.
Google today gave Android a further edge by porting Google Maps Navigation to Android 1.6 phones. The update gives the T-Mobile G1, myTouch 3G and some international devices support for the turn-by-turn navigation system that was previously limited to the only Android 2.0 device, the Motorola Droid.
Apple devices now represent exactly half of all smartphone traffic on the Internet, AdMob said today in its report for October. The iPhone has gained 10 percent of absolute share since August to reach 50 percent while Symbian has fallen again to 25 percent. Apple has identical share in the US.
Verizon today finally set out a launch for the Samsung Omnia II on its network. As confirmed in a leak, the Windows Mobile 6.5 flagship will reach the carrier's stores on December 2nd and should sell for $200 on contract, though only after a $100 rebate. The new edition also brings support for Visual Voice Mail, VZ Navigator and V CAST media apps.
Dell's Mini 3i is shipping to China with a possible unfair competitive advantage against the iPhone. The Android phone should be available by the end of the month through China Mobile's retail partners and later through Dell's own site. As expected, it will drop 3G and Wi-Fi due to the government-backed carrier's preferences but will still have a 640x360 capacitive touchscreen, GPS, Bluetooth and microSDHC storage.
The elimination of the iPhone's exclusivity to Orange in France has resulted in "more than double" the sales of the device and dealt a blow to the BlackBerry, according to research notes issued recently. Estimates from Bernstein, Strategy Analytics and others report twice as many iPhones being shipped in the summer quarter as in the spring due specifically to Apple's handset being readily available at Bouygues Telecom as well as SFR. That added exposure is thought to have directly impacted RIM as customers at the new carriers had a new, major alternative to the BlackBerry line.
Motorola today confirmed it will soon fix the problems with its Droid phone's camera by releasing an automatic over-the-air update to the handset. The Android handset's 5-megapixel camera has been said to have trouble focusing and producing red corners in images when photos are being taken. The intermittent problem has been blamed on an unusual timing bug where particular states of the clock create problems with the autofocusing system. Users can simply change the date on the phone to resolve the issue, although a permanent fix is apparently due soon.
US Cellular has added the Motorola Crush to its lineup on Friday. The handset is unique in its placement of the lock and call buttons above its 2.8-inch, 240x400 resolution touchscreen instead of below it, as is usual. There is also a 2-megapixel camera, stereo Bluetooth support and a microSDHC memory card slot.
Motorola's Motus has been spotted in a leak that also suggests it won't be exclusive to T-Mobile. The device appears to be a smaller version of the Cliq with its directional pad "hidden" in the QWERTY keyboard section. A lone photo from AndroidAndMe also suggests it will be a "reverse" flip where the phone opens like a clamshell, although it's not yet confirmed at this stage.
T-Mobile's US branch may land a deal with another carrier to grow its network much more rapidly, a rumor maintained on Friday. Sources for the German paper Handelsblatt claimed that Deutsche Telekom, T-Mobile's parent, is in the "early stages" of looking for a partner that would help it build out the network through a cash infusion. The top candidates so far include budget carrier MetroPCS, WiMAX-based Clearwire and even AT&T, any of whom could get a small stake in T-Mobile in return for the investment.
Sprint introduced the new Sanyo-branded Incognito SCP-6760 from Kyocera to its lineup on Friday. The handset has a glowing keypad and OLED display before flipping open to reveal a hardware QWERTY keyboard and a larger 2.6-inch, 320x240 screen. The device will run on Sprint's EVDO network and users can access the e-mail and browse the web on 3G.
Nokia on Friday said it would cut 330 jobs in its research and development group. The reductions are spread between an office in Oulu, in Nokia's native Finland, as well as in Copenhagen. Nokia isn't specific as to the nature of the layoffs and says only that they're meant to reflect the company's "focused portfolio of future products."
The Verizon edition of the Samsung Omnia II should at last ship in about two weeks if a leak proves accurate. Internal product info has the phone shipping with Windows Mobile 6.5 on December 2nd, contradicting rumors of a Windows Mobile 6.1 version. The Engadget document gives it an effective price of $200, albeit after a large $100 mail-in rebate and signing a two-year contract.
Gameloft today revealed that it has scaled back development of games for Android phones. The French software house made the move as just a fraction of its sales come from the Google platform: it sells 400 times more iPhone games than Android titles, the company's financial head Alexandre de Rochefort said.
RIM's long anticipated overhaul of its most affordable BlackBerry is coming soon, a leak shows today. Likely to be called the Pearl 9100 when it's finished, the new model has a sleeker design reminiscent of the Storm2 but with an optical trackpad like newer BlackBerries. The Pearl's familiar SureType keyboard is still present in the CrackBerry shots, but the new model should also add 3G for the first time to those on GSM networks.
Twitter today added its promised geolocation feature for tweets. The addition gives any app using the API, but not the Twitter site itself, the option of tagging posts with a location as well as to automatically draw on the location for position-based features, such as finding tweets in a certain area. It isn't exclusive to GPS-equipped devices and will work with Wi-Fi and other methods that can generate the relevant data.
The recently launched Palm Pixi handset is now selling for just $25 at Amazon, or about $75 less than it did at launch, though it still requires a two-year contract with Sprint. It's not known why the price cut has been made just days after the phone's release.
Microsoft chief Steve Ballmer today warned at a yearly shareholders' meeting that the company needed to improve the standing of Windows in the future. The executive was emphatic that Microsoft was still in a comfortable position with "96 out of 100" choosing Windows worldwide but acknowledged that Apple had cut into Microsoft's share in the past year. He downplayed the amount, labeling it a "a couple of tenths of a percent" but added that even the claimed amount was significant and worth fighting for.
Canadian wireless provider Telus is suing competitor Rogers over ads that say Telus' wireless voice and data network is less reliable than its own. Such claims can no longer be made, Telus argues, as it recently launched a 21Mbps HSPA+ network that is on par with Rogers' in terms of speeds. Telus claims requests made to Rogers to stop airing these inaccurate ads were ignored, resulting in the lawsuit filed through the British Columbia Supreme Court.
Verizon added a new rugged phone to its slate through the Casio G'zOne Rock. The clamshell is hardened to the military's 810F standards for dust- and waterproofing, shock and temperature but also now has six apps tailored for hiking and other outdoor activities. It uses its GPS both for a distance-aware compass as well as a pedometer; it also has independent apps for the lunar calendar, sunrise/sunset, temperatures and the tides.
