Voice over LTE is one of the most complex technologies being deployed within the framework of the LTE roadmap, says Peter Carson, senior director for marketing at Qualcomm. And operators have a lot of work ahead of them if they are to retain their status as the natural providers of voice and maximise the benefits of the move to a single network technology.
The UK arm of Spanish operator Telefónica O2, has introduced a tariff that allows customers to buy a new handset while tied in to a contract, without having to pay additional costs.
A pressure group with members including Microsoft, Oracle and Nokia has filed a complaint with the European Commission claiming that Google has used anti-competitive practices to dominate the mobile space. Fairsearch claimed that Google has unfairly cemented its control over consumers’ mobile internet experience and in online advertising for mobile.
UK operator EE has defended Apple’s policy of preventing mobile operators from offering the iPhone 5 as an LTE device until it has tested the performance of their LTE networks. The operator launched its 4G network in September 2012, with the iPhone available at launch as an LTE device.
The number of tablets sold globally will surpass the number of PCs sold by 2017, according to analyst firm Gartner. Sales of Android smartphones are also expected to triple between 2012 and 2017, the firm forecasted.
Ahead of its first-quarter earnings, South Korean handset manufacturer Samsung has issued a preliminary financial statement notifying shareholders that profits are set to rise by 53 per cent year on year.
Spanish operator group Telefónica has secured €200m of capital from Canada’s export guarantee body Export Development Canada (EDC) to support sales of BlackBerry across its global operations.
Social networking site Facebook has unveiled an Android launcher application designed to encourage consumers to become more reliant on its services for their mobile communication needs.
Open source software player Mozilla has revealed it is collaborating with Samsung on a web browser engine called Servo. The engine is Mozilla’s attempt to rebuild the web browser from the ground up on modern hardware, the firm said.
Device vendor Nokia has poached Taiwanese rival HTC’s EMEA president Florian Seiche. Seiche will head the Finnish firm’s European sales team from June 15, while HTC will replace him with EMEA VP product and operations Phil Blair.
Ahead of the anticipated launch of a Facebook-branded smartphone on Thursday, one industry analyst has warned of the increasing disruption that the social network could bring to the mobile communications industry. In a research note issued Tuesday, Strand Consult said that “companies such as Facebook are rendering mobile operators into dumb pipes [and] all smartphones into dumb terminals.”
Canadian device maker BlackBerry is showing signs of stability after posting a $94m GAAP profit for 1Q13, representing almost a seven-fold increase on the $14m posted in the previous quarter, and up from the $118m loss it posted in the same quarter last year.
US operator T-Mobile has revamped its retail offering, abolishing handset subsidies for premium devices in favour of an interest-free scheme that separates the cost of the device from the cost of network service. Annual service contracts have also been withdrawn. The pricing overhaul is expected to be one of a number of announcements made by T-Mobile at a press event later on Tuesday, although the changes have already been made on the operator’s online retail portal.
Later this year, three teams of wounded service men and women will brave the inhospitable landscape of the Antarctic Circle in a 200 mile race to the South Pole. Crevasses, blizzards, 100MPH winds and temperatures of -40 degrees are just some of the obstacles nature will throw at them as a group, beside their own individual physical and mental injuries. Earlier this month telecoms.com caught up with the teams on an Icelandic glacier as they completed a two week training session, testing the communications equipment they will use for safety and to stay in touch with home.
Suppliers of customer premises equipment (CPE) for the broadband market had their best year ever in 2012, with revenues increasing 13 per cent to reach $7.7bn, spurred on by particularly strong sales in the cable segment, according to US firm Infonetics Research.
Doran Davies, Director of Products, HTC, Middle East and Africa is speaking on the subject of evolving data consumption habits at the Broadband MEA conference, which took place on the 19th-20th, March 2013 at the JW Marriott Marquis Hotel, Dubai, UAE. We caught up with him to find out more about his thoughts regarding the handset market.
Mobile operators in Europe are increasingly shifting away from handset subsidies to selling smartphones on installments. According to research carried out recently by Informa Telecoms & Media, close to 30 operators across Europe have abolished subsidies for some or all of their customers and moved to leasing or financing schemes; this has allowed them to cut their own costs, while still offering high-end smartphones for low up-front prices.
Struggling chip maker ST-Ericsson is to be shut down and dismantled, parent companies STMicroelectronics and Ericsson said Monday.
Samsung Electronics has announced that it has appointed two more CEOs to join the current CEO Oh-Hyun Kwon in steering the company.
Informa Telecoms & Media believes that the soon-to-be-released Galaxy S4 will be an evolution rather than a revolution in the smartphone world – but it will still be enough for Samsung to maintain its number-one position in the market.
Consolidation, convergence and competitionCalls for consolidation in the European mobile market grow louder by the week and four-operator markets look increasingly challenged. Now, those mobile operators that have already built scale seem to be suggesting that there is no option but to expand yet further through diversification.
It is testament to Telstra’s aggressive approach to mobile broadband that an operator in a country of just over 23 million people should rank in the top ten operators worldwide in terms of LTE subscriber numbers. Mike Wright, Telstra’s executive director for networks and access technologies talks to Telecoms.com about the firm’s plans for further enhancing its LTE operation with fresh spectrum and LTE-Advanced capabilities.
Jonathan Bell, VP of Marketing at OpenCloud, discusses how policy and pricing are just two dimensions along which telecoms operators can differentiate their propositions. By adding a third dimension, the service behaviour itself, operators can define and bring true innovation to the market that surpasses the traditional approaches of the past, he says.
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With summer supposedly fast approaching, many look to trim some fat and get in shape for the sunny months. The Informer has never been a huge fan of gyms; in fact his favourite machine in the gym is the one that sells chocolate. Telefonica’s UK arm O2, is one business that is looking to get lean for the holidays, though, and this week it announced that it is to trim 3,500 UK employees.