LG, Verizon Introduce VX9400 At CTIA

LG and Verizon Wireless have showcased the LG VX9400 handset at CTIA Wireless 2007. The slim and stylish handset was initially
introduced at CES and is the first LG mobile phone to come with support for Verizon’s V CAST Mobile TV service.

Its swing bar design along with the large color screen ensure an optimal TV viewing experience, while the set of features it packs should suit most customers’ needs. Becoming available during the first quarter of the year, just as scheduled, it will offer Verizon customers a 1.3 megapixel camera with video recording and flash, Bluetooth for connectivity, a card slot for memory expansion, access to V CAST Music and Video, and audio/video streaming support.

Nevertheless, the VX9400 was mainly designed for accesing Verizon’s new V CAST Mobile TV service that enables users to watch eight broadcast-quality mobile TV channels as well as switching from their favorite TV shows to calling or messaging and back, through the easy-to-use multitasking capability.

“The release of the LG VX9400 signals a new frontier in mobile technology development,” said Jon Maron, senior director of marketing for LG Electronics MobileComm U.S.A., Inc. “V CAST Mobile TV is truly groundbreaking, and we are proud to be among the first manufacturers to support a service that will change the way we use mobile devices.”

The LG VX9400 is currently available through Verizon Wireless Communications Stores in select markets where the V CAST Mobile TV service is available. It has a price tag of $199.99 after a $50 mail-in rebate on a new two-year customer agreement.

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ZTE Has Released The 3G D-Series Phone

ZTE North America has announced the global availability of its latest
D-Series handset featuring Fastap keyboard technology. The first handset to be commercially available and include Fastap, ZTE-s D-Series provides a dramatically simplified text input experience.

By using raised letter and lowered number keys in combination with an error-prevention software, the Fastap technology enables the user to type faster and more accurately than by using a mobile phone with a regular keypad. This leads to a more simplified mobile experience and enables users to send text messages faster and search the web easier.

ZTE’s handset also offers a series of advanced voice, data and multimedia applications, 3G capabilities and support for services including mobile music/video, location-based-services, mobile TV, email, instant messaging, SMS and MMS. Other features include a 1.3 megapixel camera with video recording, T-Flash memory and Bluetooth for connectivity.

‘As 3G services continue to proliferate, mobile operators are demanding handsets that are simple to use, but also offer an array of advanced features, in order to increase the use of wireless data services in a 3G environment,’ said He Shiyou, senior vice president of ZTE and general manager of ZTE’s handset division. ‘We are confident that ZTE handsets enabled with Fastap keypad technology will help usher in 3G mobile services to millions of mobile consumers worldwide. We are excited to bring the ZTE D-Series to mobile operators worldwide including the North American market.’

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Apple iPhone Makes CTIA Appearance

Following a well-established, build-the-buzz playbook, the highly anticipated iPhone made a very brief but tantalizing visit at CTIA Wireless 2007 in Orlando, Florida this week.

During his Tuesday morning keynote speech, AT&T Chief Operating Officer Randall Stephenson set the room abuzz by holding up a small object and saying, “It’s the new Apple iPhone. In fact, I have one right here.”

Apple is renowned for the secrecy of its hardware development, and the iPhone is no exception. In fact, Stephenson joked that it would be a true test of the phone’s allegedly user-friendly interface, “because this is my first time to touch one of these.”

Stephenson seemed pleased with the results. “You talk about something that brings ease-of-use into play, this is it. The ability to get video onto the phone, in a number of different formats and ways — this is a terrific product.”

And with that — less than 30 seconds in the spotlight — the elusive iPhone was on its way back to Cupertino.

A Million Inquiries

In January, when
Steve Jobs announced the June 2007 release of the iPhone, Apple also announced that it had selected Cingular as its exclusive U.S. carrier. According to the company’s press release, Cingular (a subsidiary of AT&T) is the largest wireless carrier in the United States, with nearly 60 million customers.

Jobs boldly predicted that the Apple would sell 10 million units of its phone by the end of 2009, a figure that many analysts have dismissed as wildly optimistic. But preliminary consumer interest might be bolstering the hopes of both Apple and Cingular.

In an e-mail interview, AT&T spokesperson Michael Coe said that AT&T/Cingular has received nearly a million requests for more information about the iPhone. Consumers are not able to preorder the iPhone, so it is unclear just how many of these queries will translate into actual sales. Nonetheless, it is clear that there is serious interest in the upcoming product launch.

Coe declined to provide any further information regarding the planned rollout of the iPhone at this time.

Can Cool Trump Cost?

While Apple’s phone might be the hot topic among CTIA’s 40,000 attendees, other phone manufacturers are already positioning themselves to compete with the expensive iPhone. Media analysts have frequently questioned whether consumers will be willing to pay a “cool premium” for Apple’s phone. A 4-GB model will reportedly cost $499, and an 8-GB version will ring in at $599.

On display at CTIA are several potential iPhone competitors, including Sprint’s coyly-named UpStage ($149), which features a phone on one side and an MP3 player on the other, and T-Mobile’s Moto Rizr Z3 ($99), which also has a built-in music player and a dual-format camera (portrait and landscape).

Whether the iPhone actually hits Jobs’ ambitious target remains to be seen, but its provocative visit to Orlando shows that the Apple marketing team is in top form.

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Broadcast TV Makes Cell Debut

Watching TV on a cell phone usually involves either downloading short video clips or tuning into a live feed of cable channels that approximates radio more than television, the “moving picture” stuttering along in fits and starts.

Now, two rival services are taking a different approach: broadcasting video to your phone from wireless networks separate from those that handle calls. Both show early promise, at least relative to the jitter-fest that’s the current state of cell TV.

Verizon Wireless struck first in early March with the launch of V Cast Mobile TV, a 24-hour broadcast of eight channels from major networks. The other service, Modeo, is not yet available to the public, but has been running a trial in the New York City area that I’ve been testing for the past month.

Judging from a brief glimpse at Verizon’s service during a trade show this week in Florida, it’s not a leap to say that, beyond differing channel lineups, Modeo and V Cast will look roughly identical to most users, though their underlying technologies are different.

Let’s say right up front that Modeo’s technology works better and more consistently than any cell TV I’ve seen before, and there’s little reason to suspect that Verizon’s service, powered by Qualcomm Inc. (QCOM), doesn’t perform at the same level.

The picture quality on the cell screen, though not perfect, hums along well enough that voices match up with their talking heads on most TV shows and newscasts.

But sports, and any other action footage, is still shaky.

The handset, built for Modeo by High Tech Computer Corp. of Taiwan, seems to possess enough processing power inside to keep the picture from freezing up.

This is key, as even the latest high-end cell phones can’t seem to grapple with the demands of video playback with any consistency. Samsung’s BlackJack, for example, downloads video clips in a flash from AT&T Inc. (ATT)’s Cingular Wireless high-speed network, but often sputters through playback.

Part of the problem is that device operating systems are being asked to juggle a growing number of tasks, from e-mail to music and picture-taking, and none as yet are up to the challenge.

Notably, the Modeo handset is no better when it comes to functions other than live TV, as it runs on Microsoft Corp. (MSFT)’s cumbersome Mobile Windows platform. That means, as with other Windows smart phones, the Modeo handset’s screen freezes as you navigate the menus, occasionally getting stuck and requiring a reboot.

But when it came to watching TV, the same Modeo handset performed without the constant stumbles into operating system limbo. Battery life was also impressive, providing more than three hours of continuous TV on a single charge.

The video wasn’t perfect, though. For starters, while the frame rate approaches broadcast quality, the “approaches” part becomes quite evident when you’re watching sports, especially hockey and auto racing. Let’s just say that objects traveling at 200 miles per hour seemed to jump around the track during the Daytona 500.

Reception, depending on where you live and work, can also be a problem. Although Modeo has blanketed the New York City area with 65 wireless transmitters, many atop skyscrapers, my home happened to sit in a network deadspot, and so there was no reception whatsoever.

While that may not sound like such a tragedy, given that most people have full-size regular TV to watch at home, I would have been less forgiving if I was a paying customer. For a monthly fee, I’d think most people would like to be able to use the service where they spend the most time, including home.

Both Modeo and V Cast suffer slight delays on channel changes, but the wait isn’t horrible. Modeo says it will cut the delay to less than two seconds.

Perhaps the most notable difference between Modeo and V Cast was the channel guide. I can’t imagine it’ll be hard to fix, but Modeo’s guide featured tiny uniform type with little more than boxes to set different channels and listings apart. Thanks to just a little color and bold lettering, V Cast’s was far easier to scan.

In terms of screens, the first two V Cast handsets offer a nice widescreen option. The display on the VX 9400 from LG Electronics Co. swivels to a horizontal position, while the SCH-u620 from Samsung Electronics Co. can be held sideways. Both have a pull-out antenna, whereas the Modeo’s is internal.

While the novelty of cell TV is obvious, it’s hard to figure whether consumers will see enough value in this type of service to pay $10 or more a month to get it.

It’s easy to dismiss the notion of watching TV on a tiny cell screen, and yet the wireless industry has pursued this technology as manifest mobile destiny. The Watchman portable TV from Sony Corp. (SNE) never caught on like its music-only cousin, the Walkman. But to be fair, the Watchman was a standalone device - and you couldn’t call people with it.

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New LCD Mobile Display From Samsung

Samsung Electronics announced earlier this week that it has developed a 2.1″ LCD panel for high-end mobile devices that will provide qVGA resolution and comes equipped with sensors designed to adjust brightness to optimize ambient lighting. Screen brightness is automatically adjusted to enhance readability under any lighting condition.

Designed for use in high-end mobile phones, PDAs and portable media players, the new panel also has a temperature compensation sensor embedded in its LCD driver IC that maintains a steady operational mode regardless of any temperature change in the surrounding environment.

Samsung stated that its panel consumes 20-30 percent less electric power than other displays with the same size and resolution.

To enable extremely slim mobile designs, the new LCD mobile display makes use of a proprietary technology called Adaptive Brightness Control (ABC) that is designed with an ultra-slim black matrix embedded within the display’s structure that measures no more than a single millimeter. The ABC is part of a unique, cost-saving architecture that consists of tiny, highly responsive circuit sensors built into the display panel, which eliminates the need for photo-sensors and complex signal processing circuits.

The signal processing function within the display driver IC converts ambient light measurements from the sensors into pulse-width modulation signals. Those signals then automatically signal the LED controller in the LCD backlight unit to adjust the screen brightness to provide optimal readability as outside lighting conditions change.

Samsung’s LCD Business is planning to produce the new 2.1″ qVGA LCD with ABC capability in the second half of this year.

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Motorola MOTOFONE F3 review: Budget wonder

Motorola Fone F3 or Motofone is a unique mobile device. It unites the latest modern trends, on one hand, and a very basic functional menu, on the other.

Key features

* modern slim design
* good keypad
* solid construction
* high contrast display with large font
* long lasting battery
* voice help
* alarm clock
* very basic functions
* extremely low price

Main disadvantages

* segmented display – only six letters in line
* certain characters and symbols are difficult to read
* does not make difference between upper and lower case letters
* some basic characters are not possible to type
* uneven backlighting of the display and the keypad
* 7 pre-installed, non-configurable, and unpleasant polyphonic ringtones

All developed European, far-eastern and American markets are already thicken with mobile phones, so no more turbulent increase of the number of mobiles sold there can be expected in the future. That is why phone manufacturers start to slowly turn their attention towards world destinations of slower-path economic growth, like Africa and India, for example, where mobile phones are still considered expensive. In fact, only very cheap phones with basic functions and simple controls can gain ground in these regions due to their poor economical situation. In this sense, Motofone (its full name is Motorola FONE F3) seems to be the ideal solution for the purpose.

The official presentation of Motofone in the middle of the last year raised a huge wave of public interest. It is a part of a mobile communication development project that is to be carried out in the developing countries. The name of the project is „Connecting the Unconnected“; along with Motofone it also embraces the construction of BTS stations (Base Transceiver Stations) powered by an alternative energy source such as wind energy, solar energy, and biomass.

The slimmest Motorola ever

Motofone’s design follows the latest fashion trends. Certainly nobody had expected the cheapest phone on the market to be only 9 mm thin and thus being the slimmest Motorola ever. The other two dimensions are 114 x 47 mm. Its weight surprises too - meager 68 g. Despite of looking fragile the phone stands bending pretty successfully thanks to the solid and resistant plastic material used for its covers.

The phone is a little bit more resistant than standard average devices, both in terms of firmness and structural design concept. All electronic parts are encapsulated so the device could even resist a mild shower. The latter was demonstrated at Motorola’s presentation show, where mineral water was poured onto the phone; even so it continued to function without problems.

The sides of the phone do not feature any control elements, just the engraved logo of the manufacturer. The only element hidden on the left is a small slot for a charger and a headset. On the top there is a large eyelet for a wrist band.

The rear part of the phone consists of a battery cover, four tiny screws, one in each corner, and the manufacturer’s logo. Once released, the battery cover opens up to the side. It discloses a standard 700 mAh Li-Ion battery. According to the officially published information, after a single charge, the phone should be able to back up 270 minutes of call time or 300 hours on stand-by. We had the opportunity to test Motofone for about a week so we cannot provide you with an objective valuation of its true durability. Nonetheless, our short experience allows us to estimate Motofone might quite successfully last for a week if used moderately. We were quite surprised by the long charging time, though, about 4 hours. The SIM card is inserted in a slot next to the battery; it is very easy to get in or out.

Flat keypad with rubber strips

The front cover is made of a metall-looking plastic different from the one used on the rest of the phone. Motofone is coming on the market in three color versions: black, red, and blue. We had the chance to test the modest among them: the black one. Red and blue look far more interesting.

All keys but the navigation button are integral parts of the front cover and are therefore activated by a press straight onto the plastic area. This eliminates any fear regarding dust under the keys. A protruding rubber strip separates each line on the keypad facilitating orientation. On the whole, typing on Motofone keypad is quite comfortable. When you press on a certain plastic area,the key feedback is sure and positive. Keys are large; typing errors happen seldom.

The functional part of the keypad is dominated by a four-way navigation key without a confirming center. It is made of glossy silver plastic material with eye-catching concentric circles and is slightly exerted above the surrounding surface – much like on the Motorola SLVR L7. The four ways are accentuated by small plastic arrows made of the same rubber material like the strips between the key lines. Next to the navigation key you will also find a call-control key, a key referring to the phonebook, and an arrow-marked context key for option confirmation. Not even here, considering keys manageability, have we got any negative remarks to make.

Backlighting is of worse quality. It is heavily uneven, being the strongest under the lowest key line. The rest of the keypad is illuminated in dazed white. When the phone is moved, one can see how fast backlighting twinkles. However, this does not have any great impact onto common usage.

Display surprising and disappointing at the same time

Motofone’s display is totally innovative. No such one has ever been seen in a mobile phone till today. It employs a completely new technology called „electric ink“, also named EPD in short. Thanks to this technology the display is extremely energy-saving. It only needs energy when visualization needs to be modified. That is why it will continue to show information even if you extract the battery without having switched off the phone in advance.

The EPD technology provides high contrast black & white image, clearly legible even under direct and strong sunlight. Of course, it also bears its drawbacks; for example, light areas on the display feature quite visible black dots and look as if they were dust-covered. Besides, visible information is characterized by evident contours, which only disappear if the display is switched to negative in stand-by mode.

However, our critics do take aim at Motofone’s backlighting, which is not only too weak, but in addition it does not permit any user-modification. In result, display legibility is far better during the day than in twilight or in full darkness.

Let’s now have a look at symbols on the display. It requires a particular explanation as Motofone's display is no typical one: it is not graphic and thus features no specific pixel number. It only consists of fixed icons and two lines of 6 characters in the top. Characters are created by the use of segments, similar to numerals on a digital watch. At the same time the bottom line of the display only manages numbers; letters have their own reserved area: in the top.

Seeing that character creation is limited to the use of particular segments, in the beginning you will probably have image legibility problems. For example, „S“ and „5“ are easy to confuse; there is no difference between „H“ and „#“. The main and worst problem, however, is somewhere else: to our great disappointment, Motofone's display is not able to visualize certain very basic characters, like dot at the end of a sentence, percentage, brackets, slash, exclamation mark etc.

The only characters that can be typed in a SMS along with letters and numbers are hyphen, comma inside a sentence, quotation mark, @-sign, and hash. Any character different from these gets automatically visualized as a hyphen. Can you imagine how ambiguous a text message lacking such characters can sound? Font size cannot be modified, either. When a message is typed on Motofone's display, applied letters look like capital ones. However, if you read a message sent from Motofone on the display of another mobile device, you see lower case letters.

To sum up, our initial excitement about the technology applied in Motofone's display gradually faded away. Its confusing images are a serious drawback.

The signal strength and the battery indicators are constantly visible. They are separated by a Motorola logo situated above the display. The logo protects the speaker.

User interface and control through voice help

At the beginning you may find Motofone's controls rather confusing, but eventually you will understand that your impression paradoxically results from its abnormal simplicity. Avoid trying to find advanced navigation techniques consistent with today’s modern mobile market. Motofone has no matrix menu or context keys. Its functions are intentionally limited to the very essential minimum. In other words, if you are an absolute beginner and you hold a cellular phone for the first time in your life, you should not meet any difficulties controlling the Motofone.

When you switch on the phone and set up the current time and date (you should do so after each extraction of the battery), the phone goes into stand-by mode. The operator name will run across the display. Here you will see a bright clock on black background together with visible icons corresponding to the locked keypad, missed calls and received messages. All mentioned details are fixedly displayed and each new event is immediately announced.

The main menu is accessed through a press on the horizontal way of the navigation key. It is composed of 6 icons located in the bottom of the display. If you do not manage to recognize what functions icons are related to, refer to voice help. According to its voice assistance, Motofone menu consists of: send/read a message, call register, ringtone modification, alarm settings and time settings. And that’s it. Selected options are confirmed through a press on the arrow-marked context key or on the up way of the navigation key. Motofone's menu and control options may cost you some practice and patience, but generally they are really simple.

Voice help (deactivated from the volume settings) tells you how to write a SMS, enter a phone number as well as how to set up alarm time or deactivate it respectively. It will not only be appreciated by people with sight handicap but also by any common user, which makes it one of Motofone's most competitive assets.

It should be possible to set up certain functions through special number codes quoted in Motofone's manual. The latter is said to have only two pages, but we cannot confirm this fact. The phone arrived at our office only accompanied by a charger; besides, our search for the manual on the Internet gave no results.

Telephony is crucial

There is no doubt that Motofone has been particularly created for calling. The rest of its functions are pure extras. The phonebook is very simplified, what’s important here is that you learn to work with it, just like it was in the menu. The phonebook only uses SIM card memory as Motofone has no internal memory. It opens up after a press on the special phonebook key assigned to it. Saved names appear in the top line, while their position on the SIM card is visualized in the bottom one. By pressing the right way of the navigation key you will reach the phone number assigned to the opened entry and the delete entry option. Contacts can be deleted, but not modified.

earching uses first name only and is relatively slow. The way a new number is inserted into the entry list is rather unusual too. It is necessary to write the number on the display as if you were to dial it; then you need to press the phonebook key, enter the corresponding name and confirm it.

Motofone works in GSM networks at 900 and 1800 MHz frequencies (there is a version for the Americas with GSM 850/1900 bands). The sound coming out of the speaker is clear, the maximum volume levels are sufficient. A loudspeaker is available too. On stand-by you can use the horizontal ways of the navigation key to modify ringing volume or deactivate ringing completely if necessary. In any case the loudest ringing is more than sufficient. Melodies are preceded by one-time vibration and get gradually louder. A silent mode as well as an vibration-only option and vibration + the loudest ringing option are available too.

The phone offers 7 ringtones, all of them polyphonic. It is not possible to download any additional ones. It is not clear why in Motofone Motorola forgot to implement the standard ringtones it used in its older models. There is no doubt that those are still pretty popular among Motorola owners. Instead it has built-in a fixed amount of rather unpleasant and pretty identical melodies. What’s worse, when volume levels are set up at maximum, the speaker tends to vibrate too heavily.

Message only if you really have to

Comfort is certainly not one of the characteristics of SMS management in Motofone. The device only offers very basic operations. As we mentioned earlier, messages are typed on a single line, which means that only 6 characters can fit onto the display at a time. Forget about assistant tools like T9 or character countdown. Motofone cannot send messages longer than 160 characters, either. When you type a message, do all your best to avoid making mistakes, because the editor is applicable to the last character only. So if you need to correct the first word of your SMS, you should delete your entire message. Once you confirm the text you have typed, the phone asks you to enter a recipient number or refers you to the phonebook, and then sends it. Notifications of delivered messages are not available here. Besides, the phone does not store sent messages, so if you need to write a message identical to one written earlier, you have no other option but type it once again from the start.

Newly received messages are alerted through beeps and a voice notification. To read them simply press the context key. Motofone stores messages on the SIM card memory only. To browse the Message inbox use the vertical ways of the navigation key; bear in mind it is pretty slow. During browsing the first several characters of each message appear on the display. To read messages press the horizontal keys of the navigation key. SMS can be replied, but cannot be edited or forwarded. Our efforts to set up or modify the number of the SMS center failed miserably.

As you could see from the examples given above, Motofone is not suitable for frequent message typing. SMS should only be written in case of emergency, especially considering the fact that the phone lacks some very basic characters.

Motofone does not feature any entertaining or organizing functions. This, of course, is logically correlated to the lack of a normal display. The phone only offers a simple alarm clock with daily repetition. If you need to wake up at a certain time on only one day of the week, it is necessary that you deactivate the alarm time on the rest of the days. The alarm alone is very loud and quite annoying; you can be absolutely sure it will make you jump out of bed. There is only one type of alarm and this cannot be modified.

For mobile beginners only

Motorola Fone F3 is a unique device, with which Motorola is going to certainly observe a significant vending success, particularly on the developing markets. In Europe mobile beginners and people in need of a cheap alternative phone are the most likely customers. Motofone features a very attractive design; besides, it offers a large font exceptionally useful for senior people. When you decide whether to purchase Motofone, however, bear in mind that it is only suitable for making calls. Do not expect anything more from it. Its display limits significantly restrict full-function SMS management.

Motofone is already being sold on the market for approximately 45 euros. This launching price has been set somewhat high due to the broad interest that the manufacturer expects the phone will enjoy. We, however, expect it to go down to the originally advertised 35 euros. If you are looking for a simple and cheap phone, you may also want to have a look at Nokia 1112. The latter is about 5 euros more expensive, but on the other hand it offers a far greater amount of functions, a graphic display, a full-function SMS application, as well as a simpler and more comfortable control and a friendlier user interface. In terms of fashion, however, Motofone is an absolute sparkler.

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Nokia finally starts shipping N95

Today Nokia finally announced the start of the shipping of the highly awaited Nokia N95 5 megapixel smartphone in Europe, Asia and the Middle East. Judging on our experience, the model can be expected to actually hit the shelves within a week of such announcement. You can see the technical specifications of Nokia N95 here, and some live photos, photo samples (beta) and Maps video demonstration from our 3GSM 2007 coverage here.

Nokia N95 multimedia computer starts shipping

Espoo, Finland - Nokia today announced that the Nokia N95 started shipping in key European, Asian and Middle Eastern markets, with expanded shipments to other markets in those regions in the coming weeks. The Nokia N95 is an all-in-one multimedia computer with a unique 2-way slide design, integrated GPS functionality, a 5 megapixel camera and support for high-speed mobile networks, making it easier to watch and record videos, listen to songs, take high-quality photos, browse the internet, or catch up on email while on the move.

"The Nokia N95 is the ultimate multimedia computer and a fantastic example of what Nokia Nseries devices can deliver," said Juha Putkiranta, senior vice president, Multimedia, Nokia. "It easily replaces a number of single purpose devices with a well designed package that is with you and connected. The Nokia N95 is what computers have become - personal, powerful and connected devices."

Designed for High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) networks and with support for WLAN, EDGE and WCDMA networks, the Nokia N95 provides excellent coverage and connection speeds. Browsing the internet and subscribing to your favourite news feeds is a pleasure using the Nokia Web Browser with Mini Map.

The Nokia N95 offers a well rounded entertainment experience with a sharp color display, built-in stereo speakers, a standard 3.5 mm audio connector and support for compatible microSD memory cards. With powerful 3D graphics, the Nokia N95 has a stunning user interface that makes it intuitive to find the features and services you want.

With its integrated GPS and Nokia Maps application, finding your way just got easier. The Nokia Maps application includes maps for more than 150 countries, enabling users to explore the world, find specific routes or locate services such as restaurants and hotels and covering more than 15 million points of interest. You can also purchase additional features, such as city guides and voice guided navigation.

The innovative 2-way slide design makes it easy to switch between different modes, going from reading maps to watching a video with a simple slide. With Carl Zeiss optics on the 5 megapixel camera, you can capture print quality photos and DVD-like quality video clips.

The Nokia N95 is based on the world's leading S60 software on Symbian OS, enabling you to personalize your device from a wide choice of compatible applications that can be downloaded to the Nokia N95, including games, navigation, entertainment, productivity and creativity.

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Sony Ericsson W580 and Z750 unveiled

Sony Ericsson have made a nice step towards broadening their product portfolio today as they officially announced the music slider W580 and the stylish HSDPA clamshell Z750.

The Sony Ericsson W580 is the third slider of the company and it is again a Walkman branded mobile much like the previous ones - the Sony Ericsson W850 and W830. At only 14 mm thickness, the Sony Ericsson W580 is equipped with a 2 megapixel camera, a 2" 262K TFT display with a QVGA resolution, FM radio, Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP and is additionally enhanced by a Memory Stick Micro M2 memory card slot (512MB card included). This quad-band Walkman phone comes with a twist though - besides all the music goodies it also features a pedometer and some sports-oriented applications much like the Sony Ericsson W710 does. Besides the form factor it is in fact functionally identical to the latter. The Sony Ericsson W580 will be available in Q3 2007.



The second new mobile is the Sony Ericsson Z750 clamshell. It follows the high-gloss design line of the fashionable 3G-enabled Sony Ericsson Z610. The Sony Ericsson Z750 is the first HSDPA-enabled mobile of the manufacturer and additionally has quad-band GSM/EDGE network support. Other than that the Sony Ericsson Z750 boasts the same hardware characteristics as the Z610 - such as a 2 megapixel camera and a secondary VGA video calls camera, Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP, and a Memory Stick Micro M2 memory card slot (128MB card included). New features include a FM radio and an enhanced resolution of the 2.2" 262K TFT display plus the Z750 is the first phone based on Sony Ericsson’s Java Platform 8 (JP-8), supporting a range of new Java programming features. The Z750 comes with The Sony Ericsson Z750 will be available in Q3 2007.

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Book editor compiling women’s online diaries

What will you be doing Tuesday? Joni Cole wants to know. And if you tell her, she might just publish the details.Cole is a co-editor of the This Day in the Life book series, which began in 2002 with the publication of This Day: Diaries from American Women. The concept of her books is this: Women from across the country submit “day diaries” of their thoughts and actions from a single 24-hour period, which Cole then compiles into a snapshot of the varied and often hectic lives of American women.

As she prepares the next installment, Cole has teamed with Colgate to create the National Day Diary Project, which encourages women to post their diaries online at www.my247life.com.

“Anybody across the country can pick a single day and she can go to the Web site and post it and read other women’s day diaries,” Cole says. The added bonus for those who choose Tuesday as their day to chronicle is that they may be included in Cole’s next book, due out in 2008.

The Web site, designed as a virtual community where women can connect over their similarities and marvel at their differences, also serves as an advertising vehicle for a Colgate deodorant. It offers tips on creating a successful diary, although Cole says there’s no wrong way to participate.

“Women should know this is not a writing project. Every woman has a beautiful natural voice, the voice she hears in her head when she’s thinking,” Cole says.

So far, the site lists a few dozen entries, but Cole expects traffic to increase as more women hear about the project.

“I thought one of the biggest challenges when I did the book would be to entice women to participate,” she says. But she received a flood of submissions, ranging from the mundane (”At Walgreen’s drive-through picking up prescriptions. I’m actually surprised I remembered.”) to the philosophical (”What more can we ask of life than that we would be missed if we were not here?”).

In her most recent book (This Day in the Life: Diaries from Women Across America, published in 2005), a mother of two from North Carolina writes about her older daughter: “One minute I adore her, the next minute she makes me want to get on a bus and leave town.”

Cole isn’t surprised by the honesty. “Writing as the day goes along almost nudges you to be honest. It does get to what is really in our heads or really in our hearts …. You don’t have time to edit or package yourself when you’re changing diapers or meeting that deadline.”

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Renewed Threat To Offshoring Powerhouses

When it comes to offshoring, India and China are often the locations of choice, but recent events suggest their dominance could soon come under threat from the Latin American continent, that, in theory, offers many companies everything they could possibly hope for.

According to A.T.Kearney’s ‘Destination Latin America: A Near-Shore Alternative’, Latin America offers “significant value and resources when compared to Asia” and “has what many U.S. and some European companies want: low-cost Spanish-language capability and a growing, relatively low-cost, skilled bilingual workforce”.

Add the benefit of time zones well aligned to the United States and it’s easy to see why many American companies are beginning to eschew the benefits of Asia and are starting to look south rather than east.

No-where has this trend been better illustrated than in A.T.Kearney’s annual Global Service Location Index, which was published last week. According to the new index, Latin American countries have three entries in the top ten, with Brazil ranked highest at number five. Chile comes in at seven and Mexico at 10, to complete the list. It’s worth noting both Argentina and Uruguay also feature in the top 25.

The annual study, which is the fourth of its kind, uses 40 metrics to compare the financial attractiveness, people skills and business environment of 50 countries worldwide, and claims, although the wage cost advantage of offshore locations for office services would last for another 20 years, wages in offshore locations for traditional services such as IT and call centres, have started to rise considerably - and no-where has this been more prevalent than in India.

All of which is great news for a Latin American economy that can offer a range of high-class services to both Spanish and England-speaking customers at costs comparable to those offered in the far-east and on the Indian sub-continent.

In the past few years, a huge number of leading global companies have outsourced crucial business functions to Latin America, among them Exxon, Procter & Gamble, American Express and Unilever. Vendors such as IBM, TCS and Infosys, have also established a presence in the region.

According to the A.T.Kearney study: “An increase in internationally standardized certifications, as well as an improved business environment (as reflected in improved investor confidence and lowered country risk) offset the inflationary pressures.”

However, problems in the region do persist.

Brazil, for example, still has the lowest score in Latin America on the World Bank’s “East of Doing Business” metric. And on these pages Kris Timmermans of Accenture claimed harbour capacity in South America was beginning to cause huge supply chain problems.

The A.T.Kearney study also heavily contrasts a recent presentation made at a CIPS conference by Mark Berrisford-Smith, a senior analyst at HSBC, who claimed Brazil does not compare favourably with other emerging nations in the sourcing world because of its growth rates. “Brazil does not fit into the dynamic model of India and China,” Mr Berrisford-Smith said. He went further: “It is not a super dynamic economy. It is not a manufacturing superpower. It’s not the supplier we believe it to be.”

It seems then there are some contrasting opinions as to Brazils standing in the world, however despite this, at present the positives far outweigh the negatives. Whilst the majority of companies currently doing business in the region are overwhelming from the US, it would be a surprise if a growing number of European companies didn’t follow their lead in the near future. Time will of course tell

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Leahy Announcement Leaves Competitors Green With Envy

Posted on Tuesday, March 20 by Registered CommenterRichard Edwards in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) | CommentsPost a Comment It may only be March but it’s already been a busy year for Britain’s most successful supermarket chain. Not only have Tesco expanded their operation in the Far East, and the US (the company opened its first store in Arizona in February), but they’ve also been blamed for damaging countless cars after their petrol was found to be contaminated with silicon. The company now though has stolen a march on its competitors by announcing it intends to become the first supermarket to assign a new “carbon rating” to every item it sells. The company’s chief executive, Sir Terry Leahy, announced the move at a Green City Initiative conference last week, as Tesco look to cash in on the growing environmental concerns of their customers.

Leahy said he believed economic growth and environmental sustainability must come hand-in-hand, and warned: “Without growth we would end up living in an economic stone age, which would be a different kind of unsustainable future.” Under the new plan Tesco will identify the “carbon footprint” of their products by measuring the energy required for its manufacture, packaging and transportation. “It’s a complicated task, but the goal is simple,” Leahy said. “I want us to come up with a clear system of labelling so in future customers will be able to compare a product’s carbon footprint just as easily as they can currently compare its price or nutritional value. “When millions of customers a week have this information and start using it to exercise green choices, believe me, it will send very powerful economic signals through the supply chain – shock waves that will change behaviour.” If he’s right – and lets face it, Leahy has done a pretty good job of getting most things spot-on so far – the implications on the supply chain will be there for all to see. Tesco have made a habit of leaving their competitors in their wake when it comes to green issues. In December, for example, the company announced they would begin running their fleet of 2000 trucks and vans on a 50% biodiesel mix to cut the greenhouse gases they produce. But their initiatives are far from unique in an ultra-competitive industry. Wal-Mart announced as far back as December 2005 they intended to cut greenhouse gas output at its existing global network by one fifth by 2012, and are currently spending $500m a year to develop environmental technologies. How many supermarkets will now follow Tesco’s lead now remains to be seen, and how much impact it will have on the spending habits of consumers only time will tell. But looking at the bigger environmental picture, Tesco, it seems, is determined to do all it can. And as the company itself never tires of telling us - “every little helps”.

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New Top Tips Book Offers Something for Everyone

When you’re looking for top tips on supply management you wouldn’t expect ‘Hang Out With Losers’ and ‘Fire Your Best People’ to feature too heavily. You would, however, be wrong, because according to Procuri and Supply Excellence, these are just two of the approaches you should be using in the pursuit of excellence.

The two companies have just published their mini e-book entitled ‘The 100 Greatest Supply Management Tips of All Time’ on their new Top Supply Tips website. And as fellow ELP blogger Tim Minahan rightly points out in his announcement post, the tips found in the book are neither complex, nor require a big budget or support from top executives. An added bonus, Minahan adds, is that they also don’t take years to deploy.

The book - which has been put together following input from Supply Excellence’s readership and meetings with supply management teams around the globe - is, according to Minahan, “part of an ongoing project to foster the exchange of best practices and to elevate the supply management discipline.”

The 100 tips on offer range from #8 ‘Four is the magic number’, which says that at least four suppliers should be involved in every negotiation to maximise competition, to #18 ‘Recruit Strangers’, which calls for the hiring of supply managers with unconventional skills and experiences.

There’s something in there for everyone, so what are you waiting for? Go and find a loser to hang out with.

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Open Source eProcurement Innovator Secures Funding

In the last edition of European Leaders in Procurement magazine Jason Busch wrote an insightful article on the future of procurement technology entitled ‘Are we facing a free for all?’, in which he introduced our community to Coupa Software. Coupa is the brainchild of two Oracle veterans Dave Stephens and Noah Eisner, who set to tackle the problem at the root of most e-procurement failures: employee non-compliance.

It seems Dave and Noah’s approach to revolutionise the e-procurement space is continuing to gain momentum, with the announcement they have secured A-round funding from the leading early-stage venture capital fund BlueRun Ventures, as well as several private investors. Coupa will use this investment to accelerate market and product development plans. The company also announced that Jonathan Ebinger, managing partner at BlueRun, and Vineet Buch, a BlueRun principal, joined the Coupa board of directors.

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Safety Officials Warn Against Qualcomm Ban

Government agencies would have a harder time communicating with the public in an emergency if imports of cell phones containing Qualcomm Inc. computer chips are banned, a federal official said Thursday.

The U.S. International Trade Commission is considering the import ban in response to Qualcomm's infringement of a Broadcom Corp. patent involving battery-saving technology.

Federal Emergency Management Agency program manager David Webb said the import ban would make it more difficult for people to receive alerts and warnings from FEMA.

"An (import ban) would significantly impact the type and quality of information which can be exchanged between responders and citizens ..., severely impacting FEMA's ability to communicate critical information at disaster sites," Webb said in a written submission to the ITC.

The ITC is trying to decide whether the ban would cause public interest problems that outweigh Broadcom's patent rights. The agency plans to issue its decision by May 8.

An ITC administrative judge concluded in October that Qualcomm had infringed Broadcom's patent, but stopped short of a ban on U.S. sales of cell phones with Qualcomm chips.

Webb's comments were echoed by other public safety advocates who said advanced features available in Qualcomm's chips such as video capability and faster transmission speeds provided advantages to emergency responders.

"There are important public safety benefits to the technology ...," said Patrick Halley, a spokesman for an association that represents emergency call center managers.

Earlier Thursday, the second day of a two-day hearing on possible remedies in the patent case, the ITC heard opposition to a ban from two wireless carriers.

Executives with Sprint Nextel and Verizon Wireless told the ITC that the proposed infringement remedy would hurt their customers and hamper their transition to cutting-edge data services.

Wireless companies are concerned about an import ban because their telephones use a technology called EV-DO in Qualcomm's chips that enables the phones to access data, music and video services.

"If Verizon Wireless cannot offer EV-DO-capable handsets, then there is no business case for continuing to upgrade Verizon Wireless's network to EV-DO," the company's chief technology officer, Richard Lynch, said in prepared testimony.

"This will harm Verizon Wireless's business for years to come. It will also harm consumers and domestic competition in the wireless broadband market while de-positioning the U.S. leadership in wireless data," Lynch said.

Verizon Wireless is a joint venture of Verizon Communications and Vodafone Group Plc.

Major cell phone manufacturers, including Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., Motorola Inc., LG Electronics Inc., and Kyocera Corp. also argued against a ban.

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Icahn ups pressure on Motorola, raises stake

Carl Icahn increased his pressure on Motorola Inc. (NYSE:MOT - news) by saying he had raised his stake in the mobile phone maker and is still seeking a seat on the board, according to a proxy filing.

The proxy was sent to the U.S.

Securities and Exchange Commission late on Thursday, a day after Motorola issued a profit warning and announced a bigger share buyback. It suggested the billionaire investor was still not satisfied.

The No. 2 maker of mobile phones also said on Wednesday it hired a chief operating officer, Greg Brown, and that its chief financial officer was leaving.

According to the updated filing, Icahn has raised his stake in Motorola to 2.7 percent, from 2.48 percent as of his previous filing on March 12. It was not clear exactly when the additional shares were bought.

Icahn, who has agitated for change at many companies and is also seeking board seats at WCI Communities Inc. (NYSE:WCI - news) and Temple-Inland Inc. (NYSE:TIN - news), urged shareholders to vote him on to the board, at an annual meeting on May 7.

In late January, Icahn announced that he would seek a board seat to try to pressure Motorola into using some of its $11.3 billion cash pile to buy back more shares.

The company earlier this month said it would not endorse a nomination of Icahn to join the board, and urged shareholders "not to sign any proxy card" they might receive from entities associated with Icahn in its proxy statement.

Motorola has lost about a third of its market value, or $22 billion, in the last five months as profits suffered from a sharp fall in phone prices and stiff competition.

Its latest quarter badly missed targets, and on Wednesday it said it would post a first quarter loss. Moreover, Chief Executive Ed Zander said 2007 profit and sales would be "substantially" worse than anticipated.

Motorola also said it would buy back $2 billion worth of shares on an accelerated basis and was increasing its current share buyback authorization program for the period ending July 2009 to $7.5 billion from $4.5 billion.

Icahn's proxy urged shareholders to vote for him and all Motorola board nominees except for John White, Chancellor of the University of Arkansas, due to existing proxy rules.

"Mr. White was not selected for any particular reason," it said, adding that if Icahn is elected and the board wants White back, it can vote to expand and add White.

Motorola shares, which fell 6.6 percent to close on the
New York Stock Exchange at $17.5 on Thursday, rose almost 1 percent to $17.65 just after the New York Stock Exchange opened on Friday.

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Wireless show to push mobile ads, shopping

After cramming Web browsers, e-mail and music and video players into cell phones, the wireless industry is now trying to make more money by adding mobile advertising and credit-card shopping to handsets.

Fancier handsets with clearer video displays, local store and restaurant locaters and new music services are also expected to jostle for attention at CTIA, the annual wireless technology showcase in Orlando, Florida, next week.

Even as most U.S. consumers have yet to use their phones for anything more than talking, the show's themes will likely cover mobile advertisements and on-the-go commerce -- spurred by a combination of wireless carriers looking for new revenue and advertisers looking for new audiences.

But because of concerns about customer privacy, service providers like Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel Corp. will likely talk more about letting consumers control which ads hit their screens than the pursuit of ad dollars.

"They don't tend to want to advertise that they're advertising," said Yankee Group analyst Linda Barrabee.

She expects the mobile advertising market to more than quadruple to $275 million in 2007 and reach $2.2 billion in 2010. The market was $60 million in 2006.

Several privately held companies including Third Screen Media, Enpocket, Medio Systems and iLoop Mobile are all expected to vaunt technologies and services for mobile ads at CTIA.

Also at the show will be proponents of the mobile wallet, which includes the use of phones to replace bank and credit cards, and even cash.

While the concept, which has gained ground in Asia, has been slow to take off in the United States, some wireless and financial companies say this could change in coming years.

Visa USA Inc., which has tested wireless payments in the United States and plans a commercial service in
South Korea in April, is sending top executive John Philip Coghlan to explain its plans in his keynote speech.

Attendees will also include privately held wireless card reader and payment software firm Vivotech Inc., which with HSBC bank is testing a service that enables the consumer to wave a
Nokia phone with short-range wireless links at check-out card readers in place of a credit card.

MOBILE WALLET

Once wireless-enabled credit cards, which consumers can wave at a reader instead of swiping, are more widely used, U.S. mobile companies will start putting credit cards into their phones, Vivotech Chief Executive Mohammad Khan said.

"Once you get to 10 to 15 percent of active cards, you're getting to the tipping point for growth at a much faster speed," said Khan. "In 2008 we're going to see faster growth."

About 5 percent of the 400 million frequently used U.S. credit cards are wirelessly enabled today, according to Khan.

Mobile music and video, which were hot topics in the past, will also be featured at CTIA this year as operators and programmers look for ways to compete with Apple Inc.'s music-playing iPhone, set to go on sale in June at Cingular, which is being rebranded AT&T Inc.

Verizon Wireless is expected to demonstrate a real-time mobile TV service with improved picture quality based on a network run by MediaFlo USA, a unit of Qualcomm Inc.

"It does feel more like TV," said Barrabee.

Less than 3 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers watch video on their phones, according to analysts, who say usage has been stunted by high prices and poor picture quality.

"It will never be as popular as SMS (text messaging) or (music) ringtones," said IDC analyst Lewis Ward.

Ward said about 17 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers bought ringtones and 40 percent sent or received a text message in the fourth quarter.

While Ed Zander, chief executive of Motorola Inc., caused a stir among investors by canceling his keynote speech at CTIA, other top speakers still on the slate include former U.S. presidents
Bill Clinton and George H. W. Bush.

Clinton signed in a law in 1993 requiring national regulation of wireless communications. He and Bush have worked together on fund-raising in the wake of natural disasters.

Read More..

Wireless show to push mobile ads, shopping

After cramming Web browsers, e-mail and music and video players into cell phones, the wireless industry is now trying to make more money by adding mobile advertising and credit-card shopping to handsets.

Fancier handsets with clearer video displays, local store and restaurant locaters and new music services are also expected to jostle for attention at CTIA, the annual wireless technology showcase in Orlando, Florida, next week.

Even as most U.S. consumers have yet to use their phones for anything more than talking, the show's themes will likely cover mobile advertisements and on-the-go commerce -- spurred by a combination of wireless carriers looking for new revenue and advertisers looking for new audiences.

But because of concerns about customer privacy, service providers like Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel Corp. will likely talk more about letting consumers control which ads hit their screens than the pursuit of ad dollars.

"They don't tend to want to advertise that they're advertising," said Yankee Group analyst Linda Barrabee.

She expects the mobile advertising market to more than quadruple to $275 million in 2007 and reach $2.2 billion in 2010. The market was $60 million in 2006.

Several privately held companies including Third Screen Media, Enpocket, Medio Systems and iLoop Mobile are all expected to vaunt technologies and services for mobile ads at CTIA.

Also at the show will be proponents of the mobile wallet, which includes the use of phones to replace bank and credit cards, and even cash.

While the concept, which has gained ground in Asia, has been slow to take off in the United States, some wireless and financial companies say this could change in coming years.

Visa USA Inc., which has tested wireless payments in the United States and plans a commercial service in
South Korea in April, is sending top executive John Philip Coghlan to explain its plans in his keynote speech.

Attendees will also include privately held wireless card reader and payment software firm Vivotech Inc., which with HSBC bank is testing a service that enables the consumer to wave a
Nokia phone with short-range wireless links at check-out card readers in place of a credit card.

MOBILE WALLET

Once wireless-enabled credit cards, which consumers can wave at a reader instead of swiping, are more widely used, U.S. mobile companies will start putting credit cards into their phones, Vivotech Chief Executive Mohammad Khan said.

"Once you get to 10 to 15 percent of active cards, you're getting to the tipping point for growth at a much faster speed," said Khan. "In 2008 we're going to see faster growth."

About 5 percent of the 400 million frequently used U.S. credit cards are wirelessly enabled today, according to Khan.

Mobile music and video, which were hot topics in the past, will also be featured at CTIA this year as operators and programmers look for ways to compete with Apple Inc.'s music-playing iPhone, set to go on sale in June at Cingular, which is being rebranded AT&T Inc.

Verizon Wireless is expected to demonstrate a real-time mobile TV service with improved picture quality based on a network run by MediaFlo USA, a unit of Qualcomm Inc.

"It does feel more like TV," said Barrabee.

Less than 3 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers watch video on their phones, according to analysts, who say usage has been stunted by high prices and poor picture quality.

"It will never be as popular as SMS (text messaging) or (music) ringtones," said IDC analyst Lewis Ward.

Ward said about 17 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers bought ringtones and 40 percent sent or received a text message in the fourth quarter.

While Ed Zander, chief executive of Motorola Inc., caused a stir among investors by canceling his keynote speech at CTIA, other top speakers still on the slate include former U.S. presidents
Bill Clinton and George H. W. Bush.

Clinton signed in a law in 1993 requiring national regulation of wireless communications. He and Bush have worked together on fund-raising in the wake of natural disasters.

Read More..

FCC unlikely to lift airplane cell phone ban

The chairman of the U.S.
Federal Communications Commission will ask fellow commissioners to keep in place a ban on mobile phone use during airplane flights.

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said Thursday that he has asked the commission to end its inquiry into whether mobile phones can be used safely on airplanes, based on concerns from ground-based wireless carriers that the calls could interfere with their networks. The FCC's proceeding to lift the ban on mobile phones, launched in December 2004, also drew comments from thousands of passengers who supported the ban.

"To add to the already high noise level within the aircraft by allowing the use of cell phones while in flight is absurd, in my opinion," a Virginia man wrote to the commission in May.

"We are currently experiencing an extreme loss of civility in our country, and cell phones are part of the problem," added a woman from Washington state, in an e-mail to the FCC last April. "Air travel is painful enough without having to listen to one or more cell phone conversations while you're a captive audience."

Verizon Wireless Inc. and the Cingular division of AT&T Inc. filed joint comments in August 2005, saying in-flight calls present "complex technical and engineering issues that have not been resolved to date." Several proposed fixes to interference raised major questions, the two carriers said then. However, European airlines are gearing up to offer in-flight mobile phone service by the end of the year.

Northwest Airlines said in a May 2005 filing with the FCC that it wanted the in-flight call prohibition lifted as long as the FCC took steps to ensure safety. "We believe that the marketplace should ultimately decide whether or not [in-flight mobile technology] will be actually used on airborne aircraft," the company said in its filing.

The FCC's action would have needed to be accompanied by a change in rules at the U.S.
Federal Aviation Administration.

Martin has told other commissioners he intends to have them vote to terminate the proceeding, an FCC spokeswoman said. Commissioners are still examining Martin's proposal, she said.

The spokeswoman said she didn't know why Europe seems to be moving ahead with in-flight service. A Verizon spokesman declined to comment on Europe's move, saying the company deferred to the FCC's authority on the issue.

But Bob Egan, chief analyst for research firm The Tower Group, said Europe could still back away from allowing in-flight calls. If Europe goes ahead with the service, it may be a matter of a more relaxed regulatory approach on some issues, he said.

Egan, a critic of in-flight calls, said interference concerns remain unresolved. "On a technical basis, I'm not sure the airline industry has done enough to ensure the safety of people," he said.

But passenger annoyance would continue to be an issue if the technical challenges were fixed, he added. "It'd be just aggravating to other people," he said. "Flight attendants would find themselves in wrestling matches."

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Motorola and Nokia Battle for Palm Treo Line

According to published reports citing unnamed sources, Palm might sell out to rivals Motorola or
Nokia as the mobile market braces itself for the arrival of Apple’s iPhone.

The news comes on the eve of the Treo maker’s quarterly earnings conference, with online industry publication Unstrung.com reporting that Morgan Stanley wants to close a deal before Thursday. Palm apparently hired the investment banker several weeks ago to explore its strategic options, including the possibility of selling itself.

Besides Nokia and Motorola, private equity firms Texas Pacific Group and Silver Lake Partners have been named among the potential buyers. Neither Palm, Morgan Stanley, nor any of the alleged mobile shoppers could be reached for comment on the possible buyout. However, wireless industry analysts are not ruling out a quick sale.

Palm’s Woes

“Palm has been losing market share to RIM and others since it switched over to Windows Mobile,” said senior Burton Group analyst Mike Disabato, who was named one of the 50 most influential people in the network industry by Network Computing magazine.

Palm’s decision to adopt Windows Mobile commonditized the Treo, Burton noted, and the company doesn’t have the leverage to compete with the likes of HP’s iPAQ in the enterprise because it can’t offer a “deal” on a desktop-smartphone combo purchase.

Indeed, although Palm posted sales of $1.58 billion in fiscal 2006, the handheld pioneer is seeing more competition with Motorola’s Q and HP’s iPAQ line vying for enterprise attention. With more options on the market, Palm’s second fiscal quarter profits and revenues declined.

And with Apple’s iPhone hitting store shelves this June, analysts predict the competition will get even stiffer. Both Motorola and Nokia could be hoping to beef up their smartphone lineups in preparation for Apple’s onslaught this summer.

Meet the Buyers

Palm’s largest competitor is RIM, the maker of Blackberry, which has not been named among the potential buyers. Nokia, the world’s largest handset maker, is deemed the most likely Palm purchaser.

The Symbian mobile operating system is the most widely deployed in the world, but it has not done as well in the U.S. where Windows Mobile dominates mobile devices. If Nokia nabs Palm, Disabato said, it has all the OS bases covered.

“The Palm purchase would be a smart move for Nokia because they’ve had a hard time penetrating the U.S. with Symbian,” he explained. “Enterprises like Windows mobile because it supports the .NET Compact Framework and ActiveSync.”

Motorola, the number two handset maker, is also reportedly vying for Palm. Motorola would benefit with the immediate expansion of its smartphone line, currently headed up by the Q. Motorola, Disabato said, would step into a marketplace it wants to play in. However, published reports indicate that Palm is leaning toward selling to a private equity investor.

The question is how this would impact smartphone users. The answer, Disabato said, is that it won’t — at least not in the short term. “The designs and internal specs of the Treo would probably change over the next few years,” he said. “But that’s going to happen anyway.”

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Qualcomm Says Nokia Patent Allegation is False

Qualcomm Inc has said that claims by mobile handset market leader Nokia Corp that its patents in Europe are exhausted are ‘demonstrably false’ as the legal battle between the two companies escalates ahead of the end of their licensing agreement next month.

San Diego, California-based Qualcomm said Nokia’s claim was inconsistent with positions it itself had taken, and said that Nokia had paid royalties for many years to Qualcomm on CDMA2000 and WCDMA handsets that incorporated chipsets supplied by Texas Instruments.

Qualcomm, which owns the most crucial IP in mobile communications, said Nokia’s actions are merely the latest in a series of attempts by it to avoid or delay a determination on the merits that Nokia’s GSM/GPRS and EDGE subscriber products infringe Qualcomm’s patents.

It said it had sued Nokia for patent infringement in the US, the UK, Germany, France, Italy, and China, and in the US International Trade Commission.

“Seeking to postpone a judgment of infringement against its GSM products, Nokia, in every one of these cases, has sought through legal maneuvering to delay the trial on the merits and avoid confronting Qualcomm’s infringement claims head on,” it said.

Nokia said earlier this week that it had filed complaints against Qualcomm in Germany and the Netherlands, alleging that its patents were exhausted in respect of Nokia’s products in the European market that contained Texas Instruments chipsets.

Source: Datamonitor

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Palm takeover expected this week: report

Palm takeover expected this week: report

Nokia (NOK1V.HE: Quote, Profile , Research) and up to three other potential bidders are interested in buying Palm Inc. (PALM.O: Quote, Profile , Research), which could be sold for some $2 billion as early as this week, a technology news Web site said.

Unstrung.com quoted unidentified sources close to the situation as saying Palm’s management preferred a private equity buyer. It speculated that Texas Pacific Group and Silver Lake Partners were among the private equity firms interested.

Another bidder for Palm, which makes the Treo smartphone and other handheld digital devices, may be Motorola Inc. (MOT.N: Quote, Profile , Research), the site said.

Shares of Palm, which have vaulted more than 33 percent this year on takeover rumors, rose 5 percent to $19.10 on Tuesday. Unstrung said the company would likely sell for more than $20 a share. It had 102 million shares outstanding as of December.
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Sources have previously told Reuters that Palm hired Morgan Stanley to pursue a buyer. Unstrung said that Morgan Stanley wanted to wrap up a deal by Thursday, when Palm is scheduled to report quarterly results.

Texas Pacific, Nokia and Motorola representatives declined comment. Silver Lake was not immediately available for comment.

“We make it a practice not to comment on rumors or speculation. We are focused on growing our business,” said a spokeswoman for Palm.

Palm has long been tossed around as a target, thanks to its popular Treo line of smartphones that hold thousands of personal contacts and appointments, as well as surf the Web and send e-mails.

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Sony Ericsson tries to bring ‘glamour’ back to tennis

Pulsating music, psychedelic glow-in-the-dark rallies and A-list celebrities such as Gloria Estefan don’t exactly conjure up images of the genteel game of tennis.

But partying, novelty and celebrity have very much to do with South Florida. That is why Sony Ericsson is spending millions to glam up the two-week combined men’s and women’s Sony Ericsson Open, which begins today in Key Biscayne, near Miami.

In 2005 Sony Ericsson paid $88 million for title sponsorship of the women’s tour. Last year the cellphone manufacturer doled out more than $20 million for the rights to the former Nasdaq-100 tournament through 2010, which it promptly renamed.

Now, it is opening up its coffers again to lure a younger, trendier audience to tennis. The 2007 marketing price tag: About $5 million, company executives say.

“This is all about being hip and cool,” says Dee Dutta, head of global marketing for U.K.-based Sony Ericsson. “Somewhere along the way, tennis became more about backhands and forehands and lost some of its glamour.”

Tennis in the dark with club music — one of this year’s novelties — and other extracurricular activities can lure non-traditional fans and media by creating “cultural relevancy,” says Paul Swangard, managing director of the University of Oregon’s Warsaw Sports Marketing Center. But it doesn’t guarantee any lasting effects.

“It can work at the front end,” he says, “but then, what’s next? What carries this thing forward?”

Sony Ericsson’s recipe includes a dash of celebrity, a pinch of novelty and a large dollop of hope that the combination will create buzz. Among the offerings:

•”Night tennis,” a concept conceived by Sony Ericsson and launched at the tour championships in November, integrates tennis, lights and music. Fans who register at www.night-tennis.com (or www.sonyericsson.com/miami) can watch indoor tennis played by pros using reflective gear under ultraviolet lights while top-name DJs such as Paul Oakenfold spin house beats in downtown Miami.

•Taking a page from the NBA, where stars such as Spike Lee and Jack Nicholson are ready TV targets, the tournament has confirmed celebrities ranging from pop star Estefan to ex-heavyweight champ Lennox Lewis.

They will be around the tournament or in prominent, camera-available seats.

•The tournament will feature on-site fashion shows from designers such as Diane von Furstenberg and Roberto Cavalli, along with themed nights such as fire (pyrotechnics) and South Beach (hot bodies, dancing and costumes).

“Really cool things are going on here,” says ninth-ranked Jelena Jankovic of Serbia. “It makes it exciting for both players and fans.”

David Carter, executive director of the University of California’s Sports Business Institute, says anything that helps an event break out of the clutter of entertainment options is a plus.

“You have to go out of your way to position yourself to create a buzz around your event, especially if you want to tap into a younger, hipper demographic,” Carter says.

Read More..

Nokia-Qualcomm legal battle heats up

Nokia Corp. fired the latest salvo in its legal war with Qualcomm Inc. Monday, asking European officials to end the latter’s patents covering technology used in wireless phones across the globe.

The Finland-based wireless gearmaker filed complaints in Germany and the Netherlands, seeking declarations that Qualcomm’s European patents have been exhausted.
The move was the latest in an escalating battle between the two rivals. Nokia (NOK :
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NOK22.25, +0.11, +0.5% ) , which is the world’s largest maker of wireless handsets, is seeking to break or at least loosen Qualcomm’s hold on patents for CDMA, the digital-wireless technology that is becoming the standard in the marketplace.
San Diego-based Qualcomm (QCOM :
QUALCOMM Incorporated

by contrast, believes that Nokia is trying to destroy its business model, which relies in a large part on royalties generated from its intellectual property.
“Our business model is creating a lot of competition,” Qualcomm Chief Executive Paul Jacobs said at the company’s annual shareholders meeting last week. “Entrenched manufacturers don’t like to see that, and they are trying anything they can to slow that virtuous cycle down.”
‘What you’re seeing here is Nokia’s trying to bust up Qualcomm’s monopoly on intellectual property for cell phones.’
— Ed Snyder, Charter Equity Research
Qualcomm had not issued any comment on the recent action by Nokia at press time. It also has filed legal actions regarding its patents against Nokia in several countries, including France, Germany, Italy, Britain and China.
Nokia’s move comes a few weeks before its current license agreement with Qualcomm ends. Qualcomm has told its investors that it is unlikely the companies will resolve their dispute by April 9, which is when the current deal expires.
Analysts were not surprised by the latest move. In an interview, John Bucher of BMO Capital Markets called the recent actions “the inevitable posturing of two companies over a license agreement that is due to expire.”
Bucher, who has outperform ratings on both stocks, also believes that the companies will reach a settlement sometime in the next four to five months.
“I don’t think Nokia is out to break Qualcomm’s business model. I think they have a number in mind in terms of what they want to see as a royalty rate,” he added. “For both sides to come together, both are going to have to capitulate a bit.”
A more bearish view came from Ed Snyder of Charter Equity Research, who is neutral on Qualcomm but carries a buy rating on Nokia.
“What you’re seeing here is Nokia’s trying to bust up Qualcomm’s monopoly on intellectual property for cell phones,” Snyder said in an interview. “Since we’re approaching the April 9 deadline, this seems to say that Nokia is not interested in any settlement that does not cede a lot of ground.”
Shares of Qualcomm slipped 40 cents to trade at $43.28 by early Monday afternoon. Nokia was trading up 1% at $22.08.
Legal docket
The dispute with Nokia is only one of the many that Qualcomm is battling to protect its patent position. A consortium involving handset makers Nokia and Ericsson (ERIC :
ericsson l m tel co adr b sek 10
News , chart , profile , more has filed a complaint over the company’s business practices with the European Commission.
Qualcomm is also involved in several patent-infringement lawsuits with Broadcom. Over the weekend, the two companies agreed to dismiss several of the cases that have not yet come to trial.
Three cases remain between the two, one of which is slated to begin trial on May 1. Another case will go to a hearing this week before the U.S. International Trade Commission. In that case, Broadcom is seeking an injunction against products bearing Qualcomm chipsets — which it claims infringe on certain of its patents — from entering the United States.
The ITC has set a date of May 8 for its final decision on the case. End of Story

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MyVoice Basket Enables The Recording of Mobile Calls

Recording phone calls is often needed in many business sectors with stockbrokers and insurance dealers being forced to stay by a landline to ensure that calls can be recorded securely. This is reason
enough for companies to try and come up with a better offering for call recording.

A new service dubbed MyVoice Basket now makes recording calls to mobile phones quite easy. The new offering from Satama and Memorandum is now features in almost all new Nokia 3G mobile phones. Once the software is installed, all the user needs to do is to press a key in order to record calls.

Pressing the certain key will make the phone automatically dial the recording system and connect the callers with eachother in a conference call. All this will take no longer than a couple of seconds after which the recording of the call will begin.

“In all its simplicity, MyVoice Basket is an excellent example of a user-friendly service that makes daily work easier and boosts efficiency. We feel that this service represents specialisation at its best, as recordings and the digital media are more and more interlinked these days,” says Kari Kemppi, Business Unit Director, Satama Mobility.

According to Sami Kuusela from Memorandum International, the recordings are not stored on the phone itself, but instead they are sent to a server or the user’s own email. This is meant to prevent filling up the phone’s memory as well as keep the information secure. According to the two companies, MyVoice Basket will become available during this spring. Satama and Memorandum have lodged a joint patent application for the recording service in February this year

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Yahoo Expands the Reach of Its Mobile Search Service

Yahoo! Has expanded the reach of its popular Yahoo! OneSearch service even further, to the Mobile Web in the United
States.

The service reinvents search and offers consumers exactly what they want on their mobile phones, instant answers. It was initially launched in Yahoo! Go For Mobile 2.0 and is now available for over 85 percent of the mobile phones through the mobile web as well as trough the gamma version of Yahoo! Go For Mobile 2.0.

“Yahoo! oneSearch has already started to change the mobile search game by fundamentally improving the way consumers’ access and use the Internet on their mobile phones,” said Marco Boerries, senior vice president of connected life, Yahoo!. “Consumers that have tried oneSearch love it, telling us it’s easier and more helpful than any other mobile search services they’ve used. We are delivering the results consumers want with just one search, not a list of Web links.”

It was designed to enable users to find what they are searching for as quick and convenient as possible, by providing only relevant results right on the page. Yahoo! OneSearch on Yahoo!’s mobile web site also includes sponsored search results and advertisements for further extending the reach of its advertising services onto the mobile environment and enabling advertisers to reach consumers on their mobile devices.

Users will be able to click an ad to be directed to the advertisers’ mobile web sites where they can get even more information about offerings or contact details. The service will be released in other country and language versions over the following few months

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Helio Heat Review

The Helio Heat is a slider phone featuring a 1.3 megapixel camera. Other features include:

* touch-sensitive controls
* 136 MB internal memory
* Bluetooth
* Helio Music compatibility
* 2-Inch QVGA display

Infosync reviews the Helio Heat and writes, “we’re happy to report that the Heat has an adequate lens on its 1.3-megapixel camera. Pictures still came out a bit oversaturated, causing some blurriness and overexposure at the edges of details, but overall the pictures were much better on this phone than we’ve seen on recent cameraphones, even those with higher-resolution sensors. Helio’s camera interface is very easy to use, with numbers next to icons indicating which keys map to which features. … Unfortunately, the 136MB of internal memory is all the space you have to work with, divided between pictures and camcorder videos, as well as downloaded content like music and music videos. Since the Samsung SGH-E900 had a microSD slot, we’re surprised this was omitted on the Heat in favor of more internal storage.”

CNET reviews the Helio Heat and writes, “The Heat comes with a 1.3-megapixel camera, which is a step down from the Drift’s 2-megapixel offering, but understandable since the Heat is positioned as a lower-tier model. Camera settings include image resolution (1280×960, 800×600, 640×480, 320×240, 240×240), quality (Super Fine, Fine, Normal), brightness, white balance (auto, daylight, cloudy, incandescent, and fluorescent), lighting (normal, spotlight), color effects, photo frames, a self timer, a flash, up to 9x zoom, and sounds for the shutter and the self-timer (all the sounds can be turned off if desired). As for the video camera settings, you could adjust the frame rate, the white balance, lighting, a mute control, color effects, and brightness. As we mentioned, the Heat comes with only 136MB of internal memory, so there isn’t much room to store a large chunk of photos or videos. The resulting quality of the photos was pretty good, with not a lot of blur and good color saturation. Video quality did not fare so well however, as it was quite choppy and low res.”

MobileBurn reviews the Helio Heat and writes, “The basic functionality of the Samsung’s Heat for Helio was good overall, but appears to come up a bit short in terms of talk time. Samsung claims that the Heat is good for up to 3 hours of talk time or 8 days of standby, which seems perhaps a bit optimistic to us. Browsing the Internet, downloading and listening to music, and general toying around with the device definitely took its toll on the Heat’s battery life. But when it came to audio quality, we had no complaints. We always had great reception and audio quality. The phone’s speakerphone, which was a task just to initiate, definitely left us massively unimpressed. During tests, the speakerphone failed to be little, if any, use from distances more than a foot away. The speakerphone is only of any use if you are listening in on a conversation and not participating at all. The Heat did much better when it came to 3G data access, downloading videos, music, and news quickly and without interruption.”

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Nokia N90 Communicator

Finally the complete specs of the handset are available and the list is not at all short. The E90 comes with quad-band GSM, WiFi and HSPDA support, a 3.2 megapixel camera
with flash as well as a secondary camera for video calling in the front. It features a combination of advanced technologies that is said to enhance the way users experience work and provides faster and better quality access to important information.

It also includes integrated GPS, Nokia Maps and the flexibility of the S60 software, significantly enhancing the potential for businesses to achieve new levels of productivity.

“The tipping point for widespread adoption of business mobility is upon us, and it will take new levels of performance, greater functionality and interoperability, and broad access to mobility solutions beyond the executive suite for customers and operators to realize the benefits of anytime, anywhere productivity and collaboration,” said Antti Vasara, senior vice president, Mobile Devices Unit, Enterprise Solutions, Nokia. “Now business users, and the operators and carriers that serve them, can demand a new standard of business devices combining both beauty and brains without compromise, and that is what Nokia Eseries delivers.”

“We’re making it easy for business professionals to get mobilized. Feedback from our customers shows that we are changing the way business is conducted in a mobile world. Building on the success of our first generation of Nokia Eseries, we are responding to the growing requirements of business customers with a new generation of Nokia Eseries devices that will exceed their expectations and deliver an uncompromised experience,” Vasara continued.”

According to the Finish manufacturer, the E90’s first deliveries are anticipated to take place during the second quarter of the year.

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Pantech IM-S200K

The S200K has a slider form factor and wears a tight white plastic suit with a very good looking numeric keypad under the front scroll-wheel. If you thought that the scroll-wheel is the thing you know from other cellphones you’ve laid your hands on, you couldn’t be more wrong. This is an electro-luminescent scroll-wheel that will, probably, help you handle the IM-S200K handset way better in the dark.

And here comes the best thing about this device. If other phones have as top feature a huge internal storage space, a high quality digital camera or other things similar, the IM-S200K brags about having its own “OK Magic” button in the middle of that fancy scroll-wheel.

Pay attention please! A MAGIC button! Wonder what it does: does it turn your enemies into rats, does it fulfill your wishes on the spot as soon as you press it or, even better, renders you invisible so you can have the time of your life (being hit by a bus because the driver didn’t see you crossing the street)?

Whatever that thing might do, two things are for sure. The first is that this cellphone has a price of 430 $ and, the second, we won’t get our hands on it very soon because the damned thing will be launched only in Korea on KTF’s mobile network.

As we have learned in the past, the handsets launched on its network will most probably never get outside Korea.

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Nokia N77

The N77 was designed to offer an optimized video experience while coming in a compact form factor with a complete set of features. It is meant to support mobile operators develop mobile TV services, as well as further develop those services and attract more subscribers in case they already have such a service.

The handset comes with 2GB of memory and integrated stereo speakers, also being a pretty nice phone for music enthusiasts and offering a nice set of music related features such as support for most audio file formats including MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+ or WMA, Visual Radio and an adapter with a standard 3.5 mm connector ensuring that the user can listen to music on his/her favorite headphones.

Other features include a 2 megapixel camera and the usual S60 3rd Edition software on Symbian OS. Needless to say, although the N77 has been FCC approved, there is no info regarding which carrier it will be heading to or when it will be available in the US. In countries where DVB-H is available, the N77 will start shipping in the second quarter of this year.

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Papipo! Mobile Phone for Kids

In Japan, mobile phones for kids aren’t very different from mid to hi-end phones in other parts of the world, which makes you wonder why they are considered child phones.

They are equipped with GPS, 3G capabilities and cameras and are mostly useful for parents to track down their children, but maybe not as much for children themselves.

And it’s about time someone thought about making an actual mobile phone for kids that is both easy to use and fun. Unfortunately, the phone, dubbed Papipo!, is only available in Japan, so only kids there will be able to enjoy it. At first sight, it looks like a toy more than an actual phone, which is what the designers probably intended in the first place.

Japanese phone company Willcom and toy vendor Bandai were responsible for producing the mobile phone. It comes in seven different designs, 5 for girls and 2 for boys, with themes including Hello Kitty, Tamagochi, Dragons and others, as well as extra colors allowing the change of look when the child is bored with it.

The Papipo! has a built-in camera and is packed with very interesting mobile games, including a game called ‘Color Picture’ , which is a kind of paint by number game, except that to fill each block, the child has to take a photo of something that has the requested color. Rest assured, it also has the usual set of safety features, including an emergency button that when pressed will automatically alert a certain person. Compared to other mobile phones, the Papipo! is actually quite affordable, coming with a price tag of 4800 Yen, which is about $41.

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Amelia Vega

Amelia Vega, who captured the audience during the 2003 Miss Universe Competition, is a statuesque 18-year-old native of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. Her incredible energy and vivacious nature won over the judges during the live NBC telecast held in Panama City, Panama!

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5 Minute Makeover

Updos - see Heidi Klum - are back. The nice plush updos that look like they took hours to make piling up so high upon your head are in fact very easy to do yourself. 5 Minute MakeoverFirst consider using hot rollers - see Salma Hayek - even if you don’t want a curl. It’s easy volume without having to work for it. If you can, then curl a few pieces on the top and sides with a curling iron - see Hillary Swank.

Flip your head over towards the front. With a pick or large comb tease your roots. Tease it with small fast strokes until you feel a little nest forming at your roots. Give it a little spray using JOICO’s Ice Finisher to add a little hold.
Flip your hair back and assuming your standing position with your paddle brush smooth out your hair into your desired shape.
You can use a big bristle brush if you want to see more definition in your updo. Hair SOS

Start with the back of your hair and grab a piece of hair like you’re doing a ponytail. Twist clockwise bring up and put your bobby pins in. Four to six usually do it and don’t forget to criss-cross the bobby pins if you feel you need a little support in the back of your updo. Take your top piece that’s left over and twist very lightly.

Once it is secured and you have the desired height you want on the top, pin it down with 2 bobby pins. See Reese Witherspoon. Now take each side twist it back to secure on the top building into a pile. Fix your bangs and pull any front hair back that’s been left over and secure with a bobby pin.

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