Posts tagged Becomes
Microsoft suddenly becomes a mobile behemoth — Nokia chooses Windows Phone 7
Feb 11th
Windows Phone 7 today went from also-ran to contender as Nokia and Microsoft announced a far-reaching deal for Windows Phone 7 to power Nokia phones. For the first time in years, Microsoft is relevant in the mobile market.
Although details are somewhat lacking, Windows Phone 7 will replace MeeGo and Symbian as the operating system for Nokia phones. Nokia, by the way, won’t abandon Symbian immediately. Instead, according to the New York Times, Symbian will “become a franchise business and that Nokia expected to sell another 150 million mobile phones before halting development.”
The move goes well beyond an agreement to use Windows Phone 7 on Nokia devices — the companies also announced a broad strategic alliance that includes Bing, Nokia maps, development tools, and more.
On the official Nokia blog, an open letter from Nokia CEO Stephen Elop and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said that under the agreement:
• Nokia will adopt Windows Phone as its primary smartphone strategy, innovating on top of the platform in areas such as imaging, where Nokia is a market leader.
• Nokia will help drive and define the future of Windows Phone. Nokia will contribute its expertise on hardware design, language support, and help bring Windows Phone to a larger range of price points, market segments and geographies.
The blog added that Bing will power search “across Nokia devices and services” and that Microsoft adCenter will power advertising services.
There’s a lot more as well. But the real takeaway here is that Windows Phone 7 will power the phones of the largest phone maker in the world, that Bing will power search, and that Microsoft will run the ad services.
That’s a trifecta for Microsoft if there ever was one. The company will now have massive, worldwide distribution for Windows Phone 7. And it will share in revenue from the ads delivered on phones, due to Bing and Microsoft running the ad network on phones.
At a joint press conference with Ballmer, Elop correctly noted that in the phone business, “the game has changed from battle of devices to war of ecosystems.” Before today’s announcement only two of those ecosystems really counted for smartphones — iOS and Android. Today, Windows Phone 7 makes three.
From blogs.computerworld.com
India becomes smartphone makers’ delight
Dec 30th
Business India Today Business India Story India becomes smartphone makers’ delight Mail Today Bureau | New Delhi, December 30, 2010 | Updated 08:32 IST Utilities Get social
Smartphone sales have jumped three-fold in the third quarter (July-September) of 2010 over the year-ago period and grown by 34.2 per cent over the second quarter (April-June) of this year, according to the latest IDC survey released on Thursday. This clearly underscores the trend that India mobile handset consumers have started showing higher preference for adopting smartphones.
According to the report, smartphone prices continued to drop through the year and as competition increased, devices were made available by vendors at successively lower price points. While 80 per cent of the total Indian smartphone sales were below the average sales value of Rs 18,000 in the second quarter of 2010, this proportion rose to 90 per cent in the third quarter (Q3).
“The propensity to adopt feature phones and smartphones is greatest amongst the youth and business executive segments, whose purchase decisions are driven by peer group influence and workplace usage patterns as well as larger disposable incomes and willingness to experiment with new technology,” said IDC India vice-president Anirban Banerjee.
Android gained acceptance as an operating system (OS) and 9.4 per cent of smartphones shipped in Q3 of 2010 were based on the Android OS against 2.9 per cent in Q3 of 2009. The number of models with Android OS also rose to 19 in Q3 of 2010 against only two models in Q3 of 2009. Naveen Mishra, lead analyst IDC India, said, “In the smartphone segment an increasing number of vendors are displaying confidence in the Android OS, having grown from just one vendor in Q3 of 2009 to as many as seven in Q3 of 2010.”
Finnish handset maker Nokia cornered the largest share of 31.5 per cent of the Indian mobile phone market during Q3 of 2010. The IDC report expects the year 2010 to end with total mobile handset sales of 155.9 million units.
Samsung Becomes No. 1 Supplier of Google Android Phones in US
Dec 4th
For years Nokia has been the largest maker of mobile phones on the planet. The company is still the largest supplier of both traditional and smart handsets, but the emergence of new mobile platforms, such as Google Android, are inevitably changing the market realities. According to Gartner, Samsung is now the main supplier of Android-based smartphones.
Gartner reported Samsung as the top Android smartphone provider in terms of sell through to end users in the United States for the third quarter of 2010. According to Gartner, Samsung captured 32.1% of the U.S. Android smartphone market in Q3 2010 based on retail sales, an increase from 9.2% of the Android smartphone market in Q4 2009.
Samsung Mobile attributes much of the success to its Galaxy S portfolio of premium smartphones, which recently passed the three million shipment milestone in the U.S.
The Samsung Galaxy S portfolio sports 4″ Super AMOLED display screen, 1GHz Hummingbird application processor, Google Android 2.2 (Froyo) operating system in the near future as well as a number of other premium software features.
According to ComScore, a market tracking company, 60.7 million people in the U.S. owned smartphones during the three months ending in October, up 14% from the preceding three month period, representing 1 out of every 4 mobile subscribers. RIM was the leading mobile smartphone platform in the U.S. with 35.8% share of U.S. smartphone subscribers, followed by Apple with 24.6% share (up 0.8% points). Google Android saw another month of strong growth, rising 6.5% points to capture 23.5% of smartphone subscribers. Microsoft accounted for 9.7% of smartphone subscribers, while Palm rounded out the top five with 3.9%. Despite losing share to Android, most smartphone platforms continue to gain subscribers as the smartphone market overall continues to grow.
Tags: Samsung, Google, Android, Apple, Nokia, Blackberry
Mobile phone becomes room key at hotel
Nov 7th
Print Mobile phone becomes room key at hotelSunday, November 07, 2010Catherine Deshayes
Check-in and check-out and even opening the door to your room — a mobile phone is the only key you need at a Stockholm hotel conducting a pilot project of new mobile applications, the participating companies have said…
Starting this week, a number of guests at the Clarion Hotel Stockholm will be provided with telephones equipped with Near Field Communication (NFC) technology.
The chosen clients will not only be able to reserve their rooms and receive confirmation on the devices, they will have the option of checking in even before arriving at the hotel and have their electronic room key ready in the phone when they get there.
No need to stop by the reception. Guests can go straight to their room and place their phone in front of the lock and the door opens.
When they leave, they check out using their phone, and the electronic key is automatically cancelled.
“At TeliaSonera, we are looking at many ways of using the mobile phone to make our customers’ lives easier,” Johan Wickman, who heads up the Nordic telecom giant’s research and innovation division, said in a statement.
“The NFC technology, along with other inbuildt technologies, brings a new dimension to the mobile device which opens new growth opportunities,” he added.
TeliaSonera, which partnered with among others the Clarion hotel and Swedish lock maker Assa Abloy on the project, said the pilot test began on November 1 and would last for four months.
Over time, the telecom company said it aimed for the technology to be deployed at other hotels as well as at commercial and residential buildings.
Assa Abloy meanwhile said the project was a world first and the goal was “to get feedback from guests and employees using the NFC phones for a variety of services.”
NFC is a short-range wireless communication technology standard that enables the exchange of data between devices over up to a distance of 10 centimetres.
Source: AFP
Sprint becomes a used mobile phone dealer
Oct 13th
Posted 13 October 2010 14:00pm by Patricio Robles with 0 comments
Have your eyes on a new mobile phone but just can’t bring yourself to shell out the money?
If you’re a Sprint customer in the United States, you might not have to think twice thanks to Sprint’s new Certified Pre-owned (CPO) Device Program.
The program offers customers who want a better device but don’t want to pay full price for it the ability to purchase a used device that has been inspected according to a “30-plus point quality checklist”, reset to factory defaults, reconditioned if necessary and is backed by a 30-day return policy.
Initially, three devices — the BlackBerry Tour, Samsung Reclaim and Sanyo 2700 — are available under Sprint’s CPO program. The latter two phones can be had for nothing with a two year contract.
Sprint’s CPO program follows the lead of the United States auto industry, which is largely responsible for the popularization of the CPO model. In the United States, this model has been a hit for auto manufacturers, who pitch certified pre-owned vehicles as a middle-ground between buying used and buying new. Because CPO vehicles are inspected, reconditioned and typically come with a warranty, dealers are able to sell them at a premium.
Of course, selling refurbished mobiles is nothing new. Other carriers, such as AT&T, do it. But Sprint appears to be the first attempting to sell used devices under the CPO moniker.
While Sprint is promoting its new CPO program as part of its “aggressive reuse and recycling collection goals,” the company is also obviously looking to profit from the model as auto manufacturers have, albeit in a different way. While some of us may not be able to live without the latest mobile technology, the truth is that smartphones (and messaging-oriented mobiles) are still seen by some as being too expensive. By offering CPO smartphones and messaging-oriented mobiles that cost less than they would if bought new but which are marketed as being better than simply ‘used’, Sprint may be able to attract a few new data plan customers. These plans, of course, are increasingly the bread and butter for carriers.
While it remains to be seen whether or not Sprint’s CPO program will take off, and whether other carriers will follow in its footsteps (certified used iPhones on AT&T anyone?), it is clear that one way or another, carriers are working to put more advanced mobiles in the hands of a greater number of consumers. For everyone in the mobile ecosystem, that should be good news, even if a 30 point inspection of used mobile devices is the latest and greatest industry marketing fluff.
Photo credit: MRBECK via Flickr.
AT&T Becomes Biggest Windows Phone 7 Supporter
Jul 28th
After several years of being one of the biggest supports of Microsoft’s Windows Mobile platform, AT&T has said that it will be “the premier carrier for Windows Phone 7.”
That’s what a spokesperson for the mobile carrier said in an e-mail to Computerworld this week. Although there weren’t any details on what exactly this means, it is one of the staunchest pro-Phone 7 comments we’ve seen so far.
After Microsoft royally screwed up with its latest Kin line of mobile phones, and given how much it will need to overcome to remain relevant in the market of Android and iPhone, there’s not a lot of big excitement in the air over the new platform.
It is unusual to see such a major operating system launch be met with such benevolence, but that is what is happening with Windows Phone 7. We still don’t know when the first device to support the new OS will be available, or even what it will look like.
For AT&T, though, it is a chance to latch onto something new after it is most likely that it won’t have the iPhone exclusivity to carry it through the year anymore. We’re just going to have to wait to see if Microsoft can help to put a gap to that hole.
Shop for Windows Mobile Deals on Amazon.com.
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China Becomes Important Market for Smart Phones
Jul 28th
Email to friend Print Add This RSS Feed Font size: A A A BEIJING, Jul 28, 2010 (SinoCast Daily Business Beat via COMTEX) —
The battlefield of smart phone has moved to Asia and China is becoming a crucial part that all the mobile phone makers could not neglect. Although the 3G commercialization is later than other countries in China, the Chinese smart phone market will definitely have a bright future, believed Peter Chou, CEO of HTC Corporation.
On July 27, 2010, HTC brand was formally introduced into China. Actually, before that, its archrivals have all geared up in the market. As early as October 2009, Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL | PowerRating) launched iPhone in the country. Since the beginning of this year, Research In Motion Limited (RIM; Nasdaq: RIMM | PowerRating) has given up the strategy to solely rely on China Mobile Ltd. (SEHK: 0941 and NYSE: CHL).
IDC’s first-quarter data show that the world’s top five smart phone makers including Nokia Corporation (NYSE: NOK) and Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT) all attempt to take the preemptive opportunity in China.
Before 2009, Nokia could take the first place among global mobile phone makers by snatching a market share of nearly 40% in the country. However, the robust growth of the smart phone market is changing the situation.
The Chinese market is also changing after the issuance of the 3G licenses. The general manager of eSurfing Telecom Terminal Co., Ltd. believes that everyone that has tried smart phones will not longer be willing to use feature phones.
IDC predicts that China’s smart phone sales will swell from 11 million of 2009 to 35 million in 2013. The company’s analyst Aloysius Choong points out that because 3G commercialization just commences in China, Chinese customers have access to limited data service. Thus, there is opportunity for global mobile phone makers.
HTC is one of them. Although cooperative brand Dopod has set foot in China long ago, it only takes 1.6% of the Chinese smart phone market. Meanwhile, HTC has edged into the top three smart phone makers in Europe and the US and hopes that it could snatch the same market share in China.
Apple’s success has proved the importance of the Chinese market. In the past year, the sales value of iPhone doubled and sales volume jumped more than 100% worldwide. Analysts believe that China has contributed a lot to the robust performance of the smart phone.
Apple has sped up its promotion of new products in the Chinese market. iPhone 4 is likely to be introduced into the country within half a year after its launch. Currently, countries and territories outside the US account for 55% of the sales of iPhone and China is expected to be one of the fastest growing markets of the smart phone.
(USD 1 = CNY 6.78)
Source: www.bjbusiness.com.cn (July 28, 2010)
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