mobile

After hitting bottom, the only way Blackberry can go is up

7 January 2014 by Steve Blum
, , ,

I was dead, but I got better.

Blackberry is salvaging something out the wreckage of its mobile phone business, by porting its BBM chat service – formerly Blackberry Messenger – to the iOS and Android platforms. And it’s claiming a fair amount of success. According to a spokesman at this evening’s Showstoppers CES press, Blackberry has doubled its BBM user count – going from 40 to 80 million users worldwide – in the two months or so since it launched its iPhone and Android apps.… More

Mobile innovation will continue to be the growth engine of consumer electronics

7 January 2014 by Steve Blum
, , , , , ,

Left to right: Vestberg, moderately bright moderator Andrew Keen, Jacobs, Donovan.

Qualcomm’s outgoing CEO, Paul Jacobs, Ericsson’s CEO Hans Vestberg and AT&T mobile executive John Donovan sat down on stage at CES this morning, for a conversation about the “global innovation of mobile”.

The longest view ahead came from Jacobs. “One thing that’s cool and scary and at the same time is neuromorphic computing”, he said. Qualcomm is trying to reverse engineer natural brains – starting with insects and working up to humans – to build computers with high cognitive functions that operate on relatively little energy.… More

Intel CEO's vision for a post-Windows world


Time for Linux and kin.

“This is a consumer show, like it or not”, said Intel CEO Brian Krzanich, as he gave his maiden CES keynote talk last night. Judging by what he said (and didn’t say), the consumer electronics world is built on Linux and Android. His focus was on wearables.

“They don’t integrate all the features you want, you still had to have something else with you”, Krzanich said about smart watches and other wearables.… More

ZTE turbocharging Firefox mobile OS with two new phones

6 January 2014 by Steve Blum
, , , , , , ,

LG is in the Firefox game too.

The Firefox OS smart phone universe is expanding. ZTE, which launched the Open last year, essentially as a software developers’ kit, will be unveiling two new phones based on Mozilla’s open source, HTML5-centric operating system. The expected Wednesday announcement will launch the Open C and Open 2 smart phones, which are pegged to move up the value chain with more features than the $80 Open.

Two other Firefox phones were on display at the Pepcom event at CES this evening: the LG Fireweb, which is currently available in Brazil, and the Alcatel One Touch Fire.… More

Qualcomm's CEO-elect backs away from Microsoft

6 January 2014 by Steve Blum
, , , , ,

Mollenkopf prepares to step into the spotlight.

“We continue to be optimistic about the future of the Windows ecosystem”, said Steve Mollenkopf, the man picked to take over as CEO of Qualcomm, starting in March. He was responding to a question about Qualcomm’s relationship with Microsoft, during a refreshingly informal press conference at CES today.

What Mollenkopf didn’t say, though, was even more important.

When quizzed about Qualcomm’s ability to move beyond media consumption and into mobile productivity devices, such as the Windows tablets that have stalled in the marketplace, Mollenkopf talked up the benefits of supporting multiple operating systems – which Qualcomm vigorously does – and then started waxing poetic about the wonders of media consumption.… More

Huawei centers its brand on mobile

6 January 2014 by Steve Blum
, , , ,

Absolutely phablet.

“We are the number three smart phone manufacturer in the world”, declared Colin Giles, executive vice president of Huawei’s consumer business group. “We’re moving more into a connected world, and the center of the connected world is the smart phone”.

Huawei splashed out at CES this morning with a tightly produced press conference where two overarching messages came through clearly: mobile products drive the consumer electronics industry – neither Giles or CEO Richard Yu talked about anything else – and Huawei intends to build a global brand on top of its mobile products and technology.… More

Global tech market slips after peak geek in 2013

5 January 2014 by Steve Blum
, , , , , ,

Rising volume can’t keep up with falling prices.

Global consumer technology sales hit $1.1 trillion last year, but will slip back a few billion dollars in 2014. That’s the top line forecast from the Consumer Electronics Association, which represents the industry in the U.S. and organises CES, which is getting underway now in Las Vegas.

Smart phones and tablets have driven the market for the past four years, and are expected to account for 43% of global technology sales in 2014, dwarfing televisions and personal computers.… More

De facto M2M protocol might be decided by appliance makers

4 January 2014 by Steve Blum
, , , , , , ,

Popular standards flow from the lowest common denominator.

From Ericsson’s 50 billion node mobile universe to Qualcomm’s 1,000X meme, there’s been no shortage of grand vision for machine-to-machine (M2M) connectivity at CES. Meaningful standards are lacking, but at least a consensus seems to be building around what to call it: the Internet of things – IoT.

Since it’ll be using the same, old Internet, there’s no particular worry about how to deliver data from point A to point B, and back again.… More

Mobile payment innovators will benefit as banks run scared

26 December 2013 by Steve Blum
, , ,

Actually, it was invented in Russia.

Top of my list for the most influential people of 2013 in technology are the cyber thieves who stole the details of 40 million credit and debit cards from the Target chain of stores. Thanks to them, mobile payment and near field communications technology – e.g. chips in credit cards – might finally take off in the U.S. as fossilised payment processing companies are jolted into embracing entrepreneurial creativity. As I wrote last year…

“Mobile payments is like waiting for Godot,” said Omar Javaid, managing director of BBO Global, speaking at a recent What’s Hot (and What’s Not) in Mobility 2012 forum in Mountain View.

… More

Comprehensive study shows wireless radiation does not affect people


It’s safe to take off the hat now.

There is no scientifically valid evidence that radio waves produced by WiFi or mobile telecoms equipment harm people or make them sick. That’s the conclusion of a systematic review of 29 scientific studies that looked for connections between electromagnetic fields (EMF) and illnesses that people claim are caused by them…

Idiopathic environmental intolerance attributed to electromagnetic fields (IEI-EMF) is a controversial illness in which people report symptoms that they believe are triggered by exposure to EMF.

… More