Showing posts with label Samsung. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Samsung. Show all posts

Thursday 4 February 2010

Bluetooth 3.0 to see the light of day soon

Picture Source: 3g.co.uk and simbasics.co.uk

Remember Bluetooth 3.0? Its been a while and the world has changed in the mean time.

Samsung S8500 will launch next-generation Bluetooth 3.0, a protocol that will establish transfer speeds up to eight times faster than 2.0… 24mbps!

Samsung have not been officially announced yet to carry the Bluetooth 3.0 on the S8500 but the device has been leaked to carry 3.0 Bluetooth connectivity that will dwarf previous 3mbps speeds.

The listing from the Bluetooth Special Interest Group it is slim, compact, will come in several colours, and also contains quad-band GSM/EDGE radios. Other details are scarce, and it’s likely that the spec may change considerably before we get our hands on the actual handset

Broadcom is also focusing on Bluetooth 3.0, which allows Bluetooth-centric designers to use the 802.11 physical layer to provide Wi-Fi-speed data transfers in a Bluetooth environment. Bluetooth 3.0 supports bulk synchronization of music libraries between PCs and music players or phones, supports wireless transfer of photos to printers, and sends video files from cameras or phones to computers or televisions. An alternative for Wi-Fi-centric designers, says Ochikubo, is Wi-Fi Direct, which enables Wi-Fi devices to connect and share data without joining a traditional home, office, or hot-spot network. Whatever approach Broadcom’s customers choose to take, he says, he sees Broadcom’s recently announced InConcert Maestro software platform as making the operation simple and transparent for the end user.

In addition to focusing on the higher speeds that Bluetooth 3.0’s Wi-Fi physical layer affords, the Bluetooth Special Interest Group is also focusing on low-power applications with its “Bluetooth low-energy,” or Bluetooth 4.0, specification. Bluetooth low energy will address markets such as health care, sports and fitness, security, and home entertainment.

Tuesday 15 December 2009

Teliasonera reaches a milestone with first commercial LTE Networks

TeliaSonera has rolled out commercial LTE Networks in Stockholm, Sweden and Oslo, Norway. The Swedish network is supplied by Ericsson and the Norway one by Huawei. At the moment only Samsung Dongles are available for browsing the web.

Read the press release here.

By the way, its a bit shameful that the operator wants to market itself and its using the term 4G for LTE as it probably sounds more sexy :) I blogged couple of years back and it still applies that LTE is 3.9G and IMT-Advanced/LTE-Advanced is 4G.

Thursday 3 September 2009

Samsung claims First commercial LTE Modem development


Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., announced that it has developed the first Long Term Evolution (LTE) modem that complies with the latest standards of the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP), which were released in March 2009. Utilizing Release 8 of the 3GPP, this LTE modem is a significant upgrade from the previous standard that was released in December 2008.

The modem, branded the Kalmia, supports download speed up to 100Mbps and upload speed of 50Mbps within the 20MHz frequency bandwidth. Users of a mobile device equipped with the LTE chipset can download a high-definition movie file (800MB) in one minute at speeds of 100Mbps, while simultaneously streaming four high-definition movies with no buffering.

Samsung also announced it has successfully developed a 3G baseband modem based on the Release 7 standard with an HSPA (High Speed Packet Access) Evolution platform.

This modem, branded the Broom, allows download speeds of up to 28Mbps and upload speeds of 11.5 Mbps. This makes the Release 7 more than twice as fast as the Release 6 HSPA Service, which had a maximum download speed of 14.4Mbps.

Separately, Samsung Electronics has also developed the mobile WiMAX (IEEE 802.16e) modem chip, a product that is already resonating in the mobile market. The company has already adopted the modem into commercial WiBro handsets in Korea. With this new modem, Samsung has delivered WiMAX and LTE model solutions, which are the two major wireless mobile communications systems for the next generation. The company has also demonstrated a full lineup of modems from 2G/3G to modems for the next generation of mobile telecommunication systems with its HSDPA Evolution modems.

Samsung is also strengthening its position as a leader in mobile telecommunication system standards. Samsung currently holds the most chairman seats within the IEEE 802.16 Working Group, a WiMAX standardization association, and also chairs the WiMAX Forum, an affiliate organization. Additionally, Samsung is highly influential in securing many leading positions in other organizations such as the Technology Working Group.

At 3GPP, an association that specifies standards for LTE, Samsung ranks in the top group according to its number of contributions and has four seats in the wireless networking standardization working group executive board. Samsung has also served as the chair for two years in the steering committee of LSTI (LTE/SAE Trial Initiative), an organization that works closely with LTE. The company is also actively participating in various programs for NGMN (Next Generation Mobile Networks), a business association of global and leading mobile operators.

Wednesday 29 July 2009

Q2 Mobile sales: No surprises but lots of good news


Nokia, the world's largest maker of mobile phones, reported Thursday that its second-quarter operating profit fell 71 percent to 427 million euros ($600 million) from 1.47 billion euros during the same quarter a year earlier.

The company also reported that sales fell about 25 percent to 9.9 billion euros in the second quarter. But sales were up 7 percent sequentially from the first quarter of 2008.

Nokia shipped 103.2 million units during the quarter, which was down about 15 percent compared with a year earlier. But shipments were up 11 percent sequentially compared with the first quarter of this year.

Nokia said that it increased its market share sequentially for global sales of mobile phones to an estimated 38 percent. And its smartphone market share grew sequentially to 41 percent.

Toward the end of the second quarter, Nokia brought its N97 smartphone to the U.S. market.

It was bound to happen, but we didn’t think the Nokia N97 would outsell the Nokia 5800 quite as quickly as it has. However, from sales figures that have just been released, it looks like the big fight of the summer is going to be between Nokia’s two touchscreen smartphones.

The top ten phones currently being sold by Vodafone looks something like this:

1. Nokia N97 32GB
2. Nokia 5800
3. Sony Ericsson W595
4. Sony Ericsson C510
5. Samsung Jet
6. Samsung Tocco Ultra Edition
7. Samsung Steel L810
8. Nokia 6300
9. BlackBerry Storm
10. HTC Magic

South Korean company Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd recently announced the earnings results for the second quarter of the ongoing year. Globally, the company registered an 11.7 percent increase in revenues during the quarter on a yearly basis, reaching 32.51 trillion Korean won, and posted 2.52 trillion won operating profit, up 436 percent compared to the previous quarter of the year.

Samsung’s Telecommunications business also went up compared to the same time frame last year, reaching 10.04 trillion won in revenue, or a 27.4 percent increase, while the operating profit was of 1.00 trillion won, with a 10 percent margin. During the three-month period, the company says, its mobile phones sales reached 52.3 million units, marking a 14 percent increase compared to the previous quarter.

LG Electronics posted a record quarterly profit on strong mobile phone and TV sales, helping it win market share from rivals Nokia and Motorola today. However concerns over weaker margins may stall a rally in its shares.

LG, which trails Nokia and Samsung in mobile phones, sold a record 29.8 million handsets in the second quarter, up from 22.6 million units in January to March.

It posted an 11 per cent operating profit margin in handsets, compared with 6.7 per cent in the first quarter, a figure Choi said was "pretty remarkable."

The company's operating profit margin was 7.8 per cent in the second quarter and was at 4.3 per cent for all of 2008.

Fourth ranked Motorola is working to narrow losses through cost cuts in the face of sharp drops in sales, while world fifth maker Sony Ericsson is also braced for a tough second half of 2009 as a demand slump hits its stronghold mid-range products focused on camera and music features.

Apple's quarterly results were better than forecast, thanks to strong iPhone sales, including its new 3GS model.

Net profits hit $1.23bn (£953m), or $1.35 a share, in the fiscal third quarter to 27 June, from $1.07bn, or $1.19 a share, a year earlier.

The US technology giant sold more than 5.2 million iPhones in the quarter, seven times more than a year earlier.

Apple chief financial officer Peter Oppenheimer said: "We are very proud of this result, particularly given the economic climate around us."

He also admitted that Apple was "currently unable to make enough iPhone 3GS to meet high demand and we are working to improve that".

Apple also hopes to make the iPhone available in more countries than the current 18, including China "within a year".

Tuesday 23 June 2009

Samsung flexes muscles in CommunicAsia 2009 with Jet S8000


Samsung Mobile is prepared to share revenue from its app store with operators and is planning further Android phones in 2010.

The revelations shared with Show Daily yesterday show how the Korean vendor, known for its go-it-alone approach, is changing the way it is operating.

This week it launched its new flagship phone, the Jet, based on Samsung chips, a Samsung operating system and an in-house interface, the Touchwiz 2.0. Unlike most smartphones, it does not allow users to download third-party apps.

The highly-anticipated, new Samsung Jet supports the latest smartphone features which include multi-task manager and Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync, bringing user-friendly menu navigations in a sleek and compact design.

The Jet’s pioneering 16M WVGA AMOLED display (3.1”) offers vivid and colorful full touch mobile experience available; the WVGA AMOLED screen provides a resolution that is four times higher than a WQVGA screen. The 800MHz application processor delivers breathtaking speed and stunning performance, making Jet the fastest full touch handset on the market today.
Samsung’s latest TouchWiz 2.0 user interface new features such as intuitive 3D media gate UI and motion-response UI, smart unlock, customizable widget screen. The Dolfin Web browser lets users surf the net and access popular websites, especially social networking sites, with ease and speed. The 5 mega-pixel camera, built-in GPS, DNSe & SRS Sound Effect technology for superior sound quality, and DivX and XviD video support for hassel-free video downloading and viewing.

Younghee Lee, VP for overseas marketing in the mobile communication division, admitted to that the mobile business was inevitably becoming more open and Samsung would have to follow.
Samsung, the world’s second biggest handset maker, opened its mobile applications storefront in February and has been running a developers’ forum since last year.

Lee said the company was prepared to jointly operate its app store in a partnership or revenue share model with mobile carriers.

“We are looking carefully at the market situation,” she said. “But our basic goal is to help consumers to get more benefit from the mobile experience, so we are not competing directly against our operator clients.”

“We are always partnering with operators rather than taking their business model,”
Apple, RIM and Android have already opened up app stores, selling directly to consumers. No carrier has launched an app storefront, although China Mobile is set to launch in September and Vodafone by year-end.

Lee said Samsung’s first Android phone had just hit the market in France and Germany and will be sold in Taiwan and Hong Kong in August.

“We are experimenting,” she said. “It’s one of the most wanted smartphones in the mobile market. There will be more for next year.”

She said Android was “the most free and open platform” and was in demand from consumers and operators.

By comparison, the Windows Mobile OS was often “quite complex for consumers to use.”


Samsung also unveiled the Omnia II (I8000), OmniaPRO series (OmniaPRO B7610, OmniaPRO B7320) as well as the OmniaLITE (B7300). Featuring cutting-edge technology, these mobile devices will strengthen Samsung’s leadership in the smartphone market.

The new Omnia smartphone line-up follows the success of the very first flagship ‘Omnia’ phone, Samsung’s milestone Open OS model which was launched at CommunicAsia last year.

With the introduction of its new Omnia smartphone series, featuring diverse functions for a wide range of user needs, Samsung truly offers a variety of smartphones for everyone - from those seeking entertainment to business users to light users.

Sunday 7 June 2009

Samsung unviels first 12 mega pixel camera phone


Samsung will release what it said is the world's first 12-megapixel camera phone this month, beating rival handset maker Sony Ericsson to market and jumping ahead in the megapixel race.
Samsung reinforced its leadership in the high megapixel cameraphone market by unveiling Samsung Pixon12 (M8910).Samsung will launch the Pixon12, which has a full-touch 3.1-inch AMOLED display, later this month in Europe and in other regions of the world in August.
Samsung is launching this camera phone with three keywords in mind i.e. Instant shoot, Instant see and Instant share which they think will provide incredible user experience.

Instant Shoot:
The Samsung Pixon12 enables users to take perfect pictures quickly and easily, thanks to a Dedicated Camera Power Key which gives users fast one-touch access to the camera function. Once the camera is turned on, users can aim and snap, capturing images as fast as today's advanced digital camera. Samsung Pixon12 also features fast image saving for next shot, so users can move to next shot within around 2 seconds. The phone provides the best photo quality by adopting innovative camera features. With Touch Auto-Focus (AF) tracking, users can simply select focus point with the touch of a finger, after which the AF function will automatically follow the object, keeping it in focus even as it moves across the screen. Moreover, Smart Auto feature allows users to capture the perfect images as the camera automatically changes the scene and mode based on its object, background and lighting. Images taken on the Pixon12 are worth showing off to friends and loved ones as they boast digital camera quality thanks to the phone camera's superb lens and Xenon flash. The 28mm wide angle lens also allows a better perspective and more full capture of a scene for consumers.

Instant See:
After they are done snapping, users can re-live and enjoy the pictures on the Pixon12's brilliant 3.1" AMOLED screen. The screen boasts a contrast ratio of 10,000:1 while providing power-saving features which increase battery life. Finally, the Pixon12 enables users to easily organize and manage photos with multiple ways of sorting - by tags, file names, ratings, and time. In addition, the multi-selection feature enables users to pull up images in groups rather than one by one, making viewing and editing photos much easier.


Instant Share:
With Samsung Share Pix, the Pixon12 lets users easily upload images and videos to popular social networking sites such as Facebook, Picasa, Flickr, MySpace, Photobucket, Friendster - a breeze. Add to that, the phone's high-connectivity functions including Wi-Fi and HSUPA capabilities mean that user's photos can be shared to their friends in no time. The Samsung Pixon12 will be available from end of June in European countries and it will be expanded to other regions in August.The announcement of the Pixon12 is a blow to Sony Ericsson, which has touted its Satio phone, previously named the Idou, as having a 12-megapixel camera. The Satio will be available in the fourth quarter.

Friday 8 May 2009

TD-SCDMA ready to battle other 3G standards


Even though LTE standards have been released recently, China Mobile will be rolling out the pre-LTE, TD-SCDMA technology soon. The TD-LTE flavour of LTE will eventually supercede TD-SCDMA probably in couple of years.

China Mobile has decided to launch TD-SCDMA mobile handsets which will procured from three manufacturers. The telco has selected LG Electronics, ZTE and Yulong Computer Telecommunication Scientific (Shenzhen) as the suppliers of handsets. The manufacturers will offer four types of TD-SCDMA handsets to China Mobile of which two will be produced by Yulong Telecom. China Mobile will also keep aside CNY 650 million to finance TD-SCDMA terminal manufacturers’ R&D. The first batch of these handsets is anticipated to enter the market before 17 May.

By far, China Mobile has completed the second-phase TD-SCDMA network construction in 28 Chinese cities. And the batch of service-built-in mobile phones are expected to enter the market before May 17, 2009, when the three mobile telecom operators start full 3G services. In fact, China Mobile has put great efforts into TD-SCDMA terminals, in order to make a hit in the coming Chinese 3G telecom epoch.


Days ago, it announced the list of 29 types of TD-SCDMA service-built-in netbooks. Such netbooks with six brands like Lenovo, Dell, Haier, Founder, HP will be exclusively sold by the telecom operator. Earlier, it disclosed that it would set aside CNY 650 million to finance TD-SCDMA terminal manufacturers' R&D.

In addition, China Mobile plans to set up a TD-SCDMA industrial park in the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang before 2011, involving a total investment of CNY 1 billion, said one of its executives.

In the first quarter of 2009, the company achieved operating revenue and net profit of CNY 101.269 billion and CNY 25.201 billion, up 9.2% and 5.2% year on year, citing its financial report.

By the end of March, the number of its subscribers had reached 477.16 million, representing a slowed growth of 19.91 million, due to a demand drop caused by the decelerating macroeconomic, squeezed space for mobile telecoms popularity increase, and intensified competition after a far-reaching asset reshuffle among the country's telecoms operators.

Besides, its average revenue per user (ARPU) was CNY 73 in the first three months, down CNY 10 from a quarter earlier, because of an increase in low-end users and application of a new charging plan.


This week, China Mobile Ltd announced the result of its third-round TD-SCDMA equipment bidding with a total contract value of RMB 8.6 billion, sources reported.
A total of eight companies won contracts in this round of TD procurement, including six domestic companies and two foreign firms.
Datang Telecom Technology Co Ltd and Alcatel Shanghai Bell Co Ltd together won a 23% share of the bidding. Huawei Technologies Co Ltd and ZTE Corp, two leading providers of telecommunications equipment and network solutions in China, won 20% and 18% respectively.
Meanwhile, another three domestic vendors, namely New Postcom, Fiberhome Telecommunication Technologies and Putian Group, won a combined 29% share of the bidding.
Nokia Siemens Networks and Ericsson Inc each took a 5% share of it.

China Mobile earlier said it plans to build TD-SCDMA networks in 200 Chinese cities by the end of this year.

Analyst Zhang Jun of China's Web MKI told PC World that China Mobile is currently evaluating phones from Dell, with a view to creating a co-branded product running the cellco's own software platform. The largest Chinese mobile operator is determined to retain the upper hand in the balance of power and brand with handset makers, and to take a Japanese-style level of active involvement in development. In particular, it has said it plans to create its own software platform, called Open Mobile System (OMS), based on Android but with specific operator variations at all layers, and it will also open an applications store to support this.

Such a scenario clearly requires one or more biddable handset partners, and Dell could well step in, alongside various Chinese suppliers, since it would gain such a major springboard for the mobile market via Mobile's huge user base. It would not only have to support the China-specific operating system, though, but would also have to incorporate the TD-SCDMA 3G standard, as well as GSM. Dell will also offer a TD-SCDMA netbook with the launch of its Inspiron Mini 10 in China this week.

According to Zhang, other vendors working on TD-SCDMA/OMS phones include Huawei, ZTE, HTC and Lenovo. The last of these should get to market first with the so-called OPhone.

Finally, Samsung Electronics intends to introduce its 3G mobile phones in China. The fifteen 3G mobile devices are part of the company’s new products in the second quarter. Products based on China’s TD-SCDMA standard include the B7702C dual-mode handsets, digital TV handsets, multimedia handsets and fashionable handsets. Products modified for China Unicom include the S7520U HSDPA-supported high-end multimedia mobile phones, online movie, internet, and music-supported mobile phones. The mobile phones customised for China Telecom include the W709, the M609, the W239, and theF539 models.

Thursday 4 September 2008

Lights, 8 Megapixel Camera, Action!

Samsung recently announced exclusive deals for its 8 Megapixel Camera phone Innov8 (Innovate ;) a.k.a. Samsung i8510 or GT-i8510.

Its a 3.5G Symbian smartphone with an 8 megapixel camera, WiFi and GPS, plus an advanced multimedia player and a whole host of other features that compete head on with the Nokia N96 and N95 8GB. The "8" in "Innov8" refers to the i8510's advanced 8 megapixel camera. This has autofocus and a dual LED flash, plus an image stabiliser, panoramic stitching, face detection and a number of other clever features lifted straight out of Samsung's dedicated digital camera range. Sometimes we have seen disappointing video capture quality with some rival phones, but not so with the Innov8 which is capable of recording VGA resolution video at 30 frames per second, or QVGA resolution at 120 frames per second. The Innov8 also has built-in video editing and an FM radio with RDS, plus stereo Bluetooth and a 3.5mm audio output socket.

More features, pictures, etc in Mobile Gazette website.

Note that Samsung has previously already released 10 Megapixel camera with 3x Optical zoom. The SCH-B600 was shown off in CeBit in 2006. Dont know if it was launched in Europe anywhere.


Reiter's Camera Phone report has some interesting statistics on Camera phones. One of the interesting bit of information was summary of Ofcom communication Market report 2007. Based on that 84% of the phones sold in UK now have camera and 38% of people surveyed said that they use their mobile camera regularly. Another article mentions that 40% of Japanese print camera phone photos. More Interesting bits on Reiter's camera phone report.

There is another set of statistics from wirefly.com (via Click Chic) for US:

  • 63.8 percent of users ages 18-30 say they use their cell phone’s camera at least once a week, while 26.3 percent reported using it daily
  • “Family events” and “scenery/sightseeing” remain the top reasons cited for using a camera phone, but social uses separated the younger adults from the over-30 crowd - 58.3 percent of cell phone users ages 18-30 report using a cell phone regularly “to document nightlife,” while just 29.9 percent of those over 30 made a similar claim.
  • individuals ages 18-30 use their camera phones to publish photos to online social media four times as much as respondents over 30 years of age.
  • 96.3 percent of adult cell phone owners report that they have a cell phone with a camera. (No surprise here, since most cell phones now come with a camera.)
  • 19 percent of adults prefer to use their cell phone as their primary camera for all photography.
  • 77.2 percent of photos taken remain stored in the phone, 45.4 percent are used as wall-paper and 38.6 percent are sent to friends via MMS.
  • 20.2 percent of respondents say they have snapped a photo of an attractive man/woman, and 7.5 percent have photographed an unsuspecting stranger.
  • 46.4 percent of all adults and two-thirds of adults age 18-30 say they use their cell phone to snap self-portraits.
  • 19.8 percent say they have snuck a picture while pretending to do something else.

Things have changed since Nokia became the biggest Camera manufacturer. Over the last couple of years the resolution of phone cameras have improved and at the same time the quality has improved as well. The are now coming with much better equipped cameras with professional quality lens.

Martin pointed out in his post earlier that Flickr maintains live statistics of the cameras being used to upload photos. In his post in January he mentioned that Nokia N95 has just overtaken N73 but I can see that Iphone is now the leader as can be seen above.

Phone Cameras is one area that is being seriously thought about in search for Killer applications.