Handsets & DevicesRSS

Sony Ericsson buys Symbian subsidiary

Sony Ericsson on Tuesday announced that it has reached agreement in principle to buy the Swedish software firm UIQ Technology AB, a subsidiary of the British operating system company, Symbian. UIQ Technology licenses its user interface and application development platform to mobile phone companies around the world and already has a close relationship with Sony [...]

NTP slaps Palm with patent suit

Mobile email patent holder NTP, the company that very nearly brought BlackBerry maker Research In Motion (RIM) to its knees, has turned its sights on a new target – Palm. NTP’s lawsuit claims that certain Palm products infringe seven NTP patents. Palm said in a statement that it has been in occasional contact with NTP [...]

VoIP over wifi hits supermarket shelves

It has been a long time coming, but Tesco has finally put a Voice over wifi (Vowifi) solution in a box on its shelves. On Monday, the supermarket chain said that it has struck a deal with UK mobile VoIP provider Mobiboo Mobile, to launch the tovo mobile internet phone. The tovo t450g PocketFone and [...]

Say no to 3G laptops – analyst

Industry analyst Gartner has warned businesses and consumers to stay away from laptops with embedded 3G, at least until High Speed Uplink Packet Access (HSUPA) is available. Over the past year, mobile chip vendors have been jumping into bed with PC manufacturers everywhere. The GSM Association (GSMA) has been one of the leading forces behind [...]

DoCoMo, Intel pitch dual-OS handsets

Japanese mobile operator NTT DoCoMo on Wednesday published the first revision of its OSTI (open and secure terminal initiative) specification, allowing for the dual booting of operating systems on handsets. As telecoms.com has already revealed, the OSTI platform supports two domains, an ‘operator domain’ intended for personal use and a second domain, which DoCoMo envisions [...]

Cicero steps up wVoIP assult with Nokia

Irish VoIP solutions firm, Cicero Networks, on Wednesday launched a Symbian version of its dual-mode VoIP client software for Nokia’s S60 handsets. The Dublin-based outfit claims the solution – CiceroPhone – will allow “seamless roaming between… wifi and cellular networks”. The software will be available by the end of November. According to Cicero, the software [...]

Nokia claims lead in music phone sales

iPods are out and mobiles with built-in music capability are the new thing, according to Nokia which reckons sales of MP3 phones far outstrip shipments of dedicated MP3 music players. The Finnish manufacturer said in an interview with Reuters that it was selling “huge amounts” of MP3 phones and predicted it will sell around 80 [...]

Too many new phones not able to play real music or video

Despite the shift in focus to real music reported by most mobile-music-industry insiders, it’s surprising to see just how few of the handset models launched in seven key markets feature music players as opposed to polyphonic functionality. According to data gathered by MM publisher Informa Telecoms&Media, just over half of the 38 models introduced by [...]

DoCoMo to allow user-installed OS

Leading Japanese mobileco, NTT DoCoMo, is preparing to publish a set of new terminal specifications on Wednesday, allowing users to customise their handset with an additional operating system or applications. The OSTI (open and secure terminal initiative) specifications, jointly developed with Intel, add an open domain, separate from the phone’s default domain containing the preinstalled [...]

DoCoMo phone uses facial recognition

Leading Japanese mobile operator NTT DoCoMo will this week introduce the first in a portfolio of devices that are serious about security. The P903i 3G FOMA phone, which is manufactured by Panasonic and becomes available on Wednesday, is accompanied by a small, flat black card, which acts as a proximity security token. If the handset [...]

SEC to have a look at RIM’s books

Blackberry firm, Research In Motion (RIM), confirmed that the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has made an informal inquiry into the company’s stock-option grants and practices. RIM is one of several hi-tech companies that have recently been subject to increased scrutiny over option practices. The Canadian vendor recently said its original estimate of an [...]

What gives with SavaJe?

Java-based operating system developer SavaJe has been getting ground up pretty badly by the rumour mill the past few days. Some reports suggest that the company is being wound up and UK staff have been sent home with their laptops until severance pay can be sorted out. Other reports claim that SavaJe is desperately trying [...]

China STiMi’s mobile TV with own tech.

China is reported to launched its own technology standard for mobile TV broadcasting this week. The country’s State Administration of Radio, Film and TV (SARFT) has introduced the Satellite Terrestrial Interactive Multi-service Infrastructure (STiMi), developed by the SARFT-affiliated Academy of Broadcast Science. Local press reports that there is a possibility that all service providers will [...]

Fusion breaks 100k subs barrier, maybe

UK telco BT may well have shocked the sceptics following reports that it has passed the 100,000 subscriber milestone for its Fusion service. The operator has caught a lot of flack in the media recently after it emerged that the service was off to a slow start, signing up just 30,000 customers by the end [...]

T-Mobile quietly launches UMA

T-Mobile USA quietly launched Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA) services this week, becoming the first US carrier to allow calling over both wifi and cellular networks. The operator has launched a site – theonlyphoneyouneed.com – which is offering UMA handsets to users in the Western Washington/Seattle area on a trial basis. UMA technology allows dual-mode phones [...]