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  • HD LCD TV with Integrated iPhone/iPod Docking Station Coming in November

    While looking for some nice gadgets at this year’s IFA, Biz-New.com came across Vestel’s LCD TV with integrated iPhone/iPod docking station. Barış Altinkay, Product Manager for Vestel, gave us a demonstration on the product as well as a short introduction to the company.

    Vestel Group is comprised of 24 companies operating in manufacturing, technology development, marketing, and distribution fields in the consumer electronics,digital technologies, IT and household appliances, with € 3.7 billion turnover.

    According to the company, they account for 21% of the total TV, 10% of the TLC TV, 25% of the digital set-top boxes, and 10% of the household appliances markets in Europe.

  • LCD-TV Market Growing Fast in Russia

    Defying hard economic times, the Russian LCD-TV market is set for strong growth this year, with shipments rising by 13.6 percent in 2009, according to iSuppli.

    Shipments of LCD-TVs in Russia will rise to about 5 million units in 2009, up from 4.4 million in 2008. By 2013, shipments will nearly double from the 2009 level, increasing to 9.6 million units.

    Revenue will increase to $5.7 billion by 2013, up from $3.1 billion in 2008.

    The research shows LCD-TVs are the only segment of the Russian TV market that is expanding, with shipments of Plasma Display Panel-Televisions (PDP-TVs) and Cathode Ray Tube-Televisions (CRT-TVs) decreasing in 2009 and beyond.

    “One of the main reasons for the switch to LCD-TVs in Russia is that they have become a status symbol. Consumers in Russia are very image conscious and prefer to own televisions that they can show off to neighbors and family members,” said Riddhi Patel, principal analyst for television systems for iSuppli.

    While the 32-inch size dominates shipments as an ideal upgrade or first television, the larger-sized TVs are becoming trendier.

    Among brands in Russia, South Korean OEMs are in a winning position because of their strong brand recognition. Furthermore, the South Korean OEMs also have domestic production capabilities and vertical integration—factors that allow them to have better control over their costs and prices.

    According to Patel, as far domestic Russian brands go, they are suffering from a lack of financial strength as well as the absence of branding. However, with a strong marketing strategy and the capability to be price competitive, Russian brands could challenge global OEMs in the domestic market.

  • Internet On The Go: Interview with Deb Hall, Managing Director at Web2Mobile

    Web2Mobile is a company that specializes in making your content mobile ready for ease of use for your customers on the go.

    In the last 12 months we seen a lot change in the mobile market with a huge transition of users putting their mobile devices ahead of their laptops and desktop computers.

    Web2Mobile works with companies to strategize efforts to make the transition as easy as possible for both the company and the users will access that content.

    When asked whether companies understand the need to transition to mobile technology, Deb Hall states, “there is confusion on the term mobile marketing and what it entails and the opportunities it can offer.” To ease some of the misunderstanding, Web2Mobile specializes in creating a suite of tools that help to erase that confusion and make the client feel comfortable changing the format of their content.

    The tools created by Web2Mobile apparently make it easier for marketers or publishers to upload their content into Web2Mobile’s self serve system and convert it, making it mobile friendly. Being a service oriented business, it looks to reduce the costs based on consultants helping companies make the change and puts the power of the transition into the hands of the client themselves.

    “We’ve all seen content not formatted for mobility, such as bad email newsletters, unformatted websites, and this content just does not transition to the world of mobility,” says Deb Hall when asked about companies that think they can do it on their own. She made it a point to stress that there is a definite need to understand the difference between the normal web and the mobile browsers and that development for the two is very different.

    Deb Hall

    Deb notes that even on a personal level, using mobile devices create a difference in behavior in how we use and read content and how we interact with our devices. No longer are we worried about being at a desktop, nor do we have to worry about the life of a battery on a laptop. In the last ten months she notes that this transition has become more apparent as the iPhone, specifically, has immersed itself into the general populace.

    She also notes that “the mobile browsing space has increased as much as 400% month to month,” make it apparent that companies want to make it easy for the end user to use the devices and access their content. With the increase in wifi tethering, the ability to access content anywhere, and making the technology tools easily accessible to just about anyone, it’s not surprising to see such high numbers of adopters.

    Is the Western World Ready?

    There is a distinct difference in how the West uses mobile technology compared to our counterparts in the Far East. Our Eastern counterparts are using mobile technology for entertainment, streaming TV, music, maps, directions, and just about every basic need possible. The advancement of technology in mobility is leaps and bounds ahead of the West.

    In response to our conversation Deb Hall states that when “[she] worked for Yahoo mobile she noticed distinct differences in how both side of the globe use technology. There are behaviors that are distinct to each country. Pricing models are different and that drives the behavior.” She notes an example on how fast mobile technology picked up in the UK and how it was based on the nominal fee for use compared to Western pricing.

    There is no doubt that the West is slowly catching up with our overseas counterparts, but there is still a long way to go. Web2Mobile is doing it’s part to help companies understand just how important mobile technology can be to their business and eventually their overall bottom line.

    Key Points

    At what point does a company consider going mobile? It’s a matter of strategy, and companies like Web2Mobile look to help companies develop that strategy. When Deb hears the word strategy she thinks about how they are going into battle. The goal is to get their clients in front of as many people as possible.

    “How do we know we’re implementing the right strategy? It’s very important to determine the key objective, is it sales, awareness, or creating a good user experience? It’s all about prioritising,” Deb Hall says regarding the key points that must be identified.

    In all the studies done on mobile users it’s been determined that mobile users are more than likely to act on a call to action. The key then becomes how to make the call to action easy to find. It’s vital for companies to make their sites, emails, and advertisement mobile ready and easy to use.

    Tracking Metrics

    A key factor for a company is to know how much interaction is being done with their new mobile strategy. Metrics give good insights on the success of the campaign, and having access to those metrics can determine the direction.

    “One of the first questions we get when we work with new client is which platform they should be on. Should I be on an iPhone or Blackberry,” says Deb about the confusion of entering the mobile space.

    An inside tip that Deb shares with us is that most companies can evaluate what is happening on your current website and from there determine what devices are accessing your content. Based on those metrics you can better plan your mobile strategy based on those percentages of iPhone vs Blackberry vs any other mobile device.

    An example Deb gave was their involvement with the Masters Tournament. Based on the metrics they analyzed they were able to serve up distinct content to users on various platforms. This makes the content unique to each user experience and helps to build that relationship between the company and their end user.

    Web2Mobile is very excited with the involvement in FITC and hopes to interact with marketers, developers, and agencies and introduce them to their suite of tools. They look to share with all attendees what they are doing and hope that more companies understand the importance of making their content accessible via mobile devices, especially companies serious about extending their brand online.

  • Apple Ranks Highest Among Both Consumer and Business Smartphone Owners

    Overall satisfaction among smartphone owners has increased considerably over time as manufacturers continue to improve styling, feature sets, usability and software, according to the J.D. Power and Associates studies.

    Satisfaction among consumer smartphone owners has increased by 14 index points (on a 1,000-point scale) from just six months ago, while satisfaction among business owners has increased by 43 index points from 2008 as these devices have become more stylish, customizable and user-friendly, the report says.

    Among traditional mobile phone owners, overall satisfaction has declined by six index points from April 2009, likely as a result of heightened awareness among traditional mobile phone owners of advanced features available on smartphones.

    J.D. Power and Associates studies measure customer satisfaction with traditional wireless handsets and smartphones across several key factors. In order of importance, key factors of overall satisfaction with traditional wireless handsets are operation (30%); physical design (30%); features (20%); and battery function (20%).

    For consumer smartphones, key factors are ease of operation (30%); operating system (22%); features (21%); physical design (18%); and battery function (9%). For business smartphones, key factors include ease of operation (29%); operating system (23%); physical design (21%); features (16%); and battery function (11%).

    Apple ranks highest among manufacturers of smartphones used primarily for personal reasons, with a score of 811, and performs particularly well in ease of operation, operating system, features and physical design. LG (776) and RIM BlackBerry (759) follow Apple in the rankings.

    Among customers who use their smartphones primarily for business purposes, Apple ranks highest with a score of 803, followed by RIM BlackBerry (724).

    LG ranks highest in overall wireless customer satisfaction with traditional handsets with a score of 723, performing well across all factors, particularly battery function, features and operation.

    The proportion of consumers who purchase more affordable smartphones (those costing less than $100) has significantly increased among most of the manufacturers included in the rankings, compared with the previous wave of the study six months ago. This indicates that wireless carriers are discounting their devices to attract new customers who are willing to pay for more costly service plans.

    "Attractive rebates or discounts offered to current smartphone owners, as well as incentives given to traditional handset owners to upgrade to smartphones, are effective ways for wireless carriers to generate revenue and increase market share," said Kirk Parsons, senior director of wireless services at J.D. Power and Associates.

    "It is important, however, that manufacturers meet the expectations of those taking advantage of such offers by ensuring the features are intuitive and ultimately rewarding to them in the long run. Providing an easy-to-use, yet powerful operating system with the ability to customize applications to suit owners’ individual needs is essential to providing a high-quality and rewarding wireless experience."

    The studies also find the following key wireless handset usage patterns:
    • Among consumer smartphone owners, 22 percent want Wi-Fi capability in their next handset, while 21 percent want touch-screen capabilities and 17 percent want GPS capability.
    • More than 40 percent of consumer smartphone owners report entirely replacing landline calling with mobile phone calling, while only 27 percent of traditional handset owners have done the same.
    • Among business smartphone owners, more than one-half report downloading third-party games for entertainment, while 46 percent report downloading travel software such as maps and weather applications-indicating business users are also integrating their devices into their personal lives. In addition, nearly one-half of owners (46%) report downloading business utility applications to increase productivity.

  • Automating Phone Calls: Interview with Irv Shapiro, CEO of Ifbyphone


    Ifbyphone does something very very simple. They automate phone calls. The process of automation can be done with pretty much any phone call.

    “Lets say for example you wanted to have a toll free number, an 800 number or even a local number for your business, and when your customer called that number, you wanted to take their caller ID and automatically look up if they have any orders outstanding with your business and if they did, you wanted to tell them when those orders would ship,” said Irv Shapiro, CEO & CTO of Ifbyphone, in response to how the automation works.

    Previously companies were using a call center to do this and it was costing them $20, $30, $40 an hour depending if it was onshore or offshore. Any company can do this using automated technology for about $3 an hour. So from the very first month, you save money.

    But let’s say also the company wanted someone to say “Operator,” “Agent,” “Help Me” at any time, and then you wanted that call transferred to your office or even better yet, transferred to people at home because one out of 10 Americans is looking for work today. All of this is possible and furthermore you could build a home-based call center very inexpensively.

    What is Cloud Telephony

    In today’s world of cloud computing, we have a concept called time sharing, people sharing large computer resources. By sharing these large computer resources, a company is able to save everybody money.

    So in today’s world of cloud computing there are a couple different models we could simplify it by saying there’s the model where you rent computer time but you bring all your own programs, that would be the Amazon Model. And then there’s the model where you rent programs and you can customize those programs and integrate those programs with your business, Salesforce is a good example of this method.

    Irv Shapiro goes on to share that “what changed was in the last three decades, more and more people bought equipment and they put that equipment in their businesses. And it was attached to the telephone system and maybe your business was big enough that there was the Telephone Guy who was the only one in that business that knew how to maintain the telephone system.”

    One of the major advantages of replacing a networked phone system with a system in the cloud is that software updates are automatic, your system does not become obsolete, there are engineers on call 24/7 so it’s a totally different level of service. Irv Shapiro stresses that this is where Ifbyphone excels in service.

    When asked how Ifbyphone ranks differently from other VoIP companies, he responds, “Ifbyphone allows small to medium sized businesses to do the things with the telephone that very large businesses routinely do. So if you call your stock broker or if you call your airline or if you call a very large mass retailer in all likelihood they are using some kind of automated telephone system to process your order. It’s more cost effective, and work works more rapidly for you.”

    Getting Over the Fear by Saving Dollars

    One of Ifbyphone’s customers is an organization called Go Configure. They are a small to medium organization that most people have never heard of. If you go to a big box retailer and you buy a bicycle and you say to the salesperson “I don’t think I want to put this together, can you have somebody put this together for me?” they will say “sure, we’ll send somebody to your home once you’re bicycle gets there.” Go Configure is that company that no only fields the customers calls, but also has the second side, the installer calls.

    What they found that on average they had to make 5 phone calls to make sure the consumer was going to be home at the right time and that the installer was going to be there at the right time. And they have replaced that all with automated telephone applications from Ifbyphone. So they expect within their first year that they will have saved $70,000. They will be able to take two people who were just making phone calls all day long, on average 5 calls to set up every appointment, those 2 people will be able to do other things for their business.

    “Saving money and resource is what is important to companies today,” responds Irv Shapiro when questioned as to what is the most important factor of moving to unique services such as these.

    What is the broader vision of the industry itself? Is technology growing with the customer’s need?

    Irv Shapiro seems to think that there are two parts to that answer. The first part is of course technology is moving faster. Google is a 12 year old company with hundreds of billions of dollars of market value making billions of dollars every year. They’ve done it for a dozen years, that’s unheard of in the history of commerce.

     

    Technology is moving faster, the challenge is that when tech moves quickly it usually leaves people behind in its wake because not everyone can move at light speed. Some people need a little time to absorb things. Things have to be put in their perspective.

    Ifbyphone’s goal is to make it so easy that if you know how to use email, you now know how to set up your own phone application; you know how to route phone calls; you know how to set up interactive phone dialogue; you know how to do voice based phone messages; because we’re going to make it as easy as reading your email.

    So you do have to be computer comfortable to use their technology, but the challenge is not the rate of changes in technology, its taking that technology and making it so easy that anybody can use it.

  • Mobile Navigation Users Increased to 28 Million

    According to a new research report by Berg Insight, the number of mobile subscribers downloading navigation routes and turn-by-turn navigation instructions using their mobile handsets increased twofold from H1-2008 to H1-2009 and reached 28 million.

    Until 2015, the subscriber base is forecasted to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 33.7 percent to reach 160 million users worldwide.

    The growing adoption will primarily be driven by the broader availability of GPS-enabled handsets and bundling of navigation applications with mobile devices and service plans.

    The report says in countries such as the USA and Japan where mass market GPS handsets are already available, adoption of mobile navigation services have already surpassed 3 and 4 percent of the total mobile subscriber base respectively.

    More recently, increasing volumes of GPS handsets have also started to pave the way for adoption of mobile navigation services in Europe where Personal Navigation Devices have been the prevailing navigation solution for some years.

    In other regions of the world, better availability of low-cost GPS handsets and improving map coverage will enable rapid uptake of navigation services in the coming years.

    “Mobile operators and handset vendors are now starting to experience the business opportunity of a growing installed base of GPS handsets and customers trying navigation services”, said André Malm, Senior Analyst, Berg Insight.

    He adds that since relatively few subscribers need turn-by-turn navigation services on a daily basis, the mobile industry should integrate navigation services with other location-based services to improve the total user experience and ensure that customers continue to subscribe.

  • New Book From Oracle Guru: "Oracle Performance Tuning With Solid State Disk"

    Dramatic decreases in the cost of Solid State Disk (SSD) over the past five years are changing Oracle architectures. Deploying SSD in place of hard disk drives can result in immediate performance gains as both Random Access Memory (RAM) and Flash SSD eliminate bottlenecks caused by mechanical hard disk I/O latency.

    The increasing popularity of SSD is challenging DBAs to adapt their database performance tuning methodologies in order to optimize application performance and return on investment.

    The book from Mike Ault shows how to accelerate Oracle databases and target solid state disk for maximum benefit, as Rampant Press, the publisher, says.

    “Solid State Disk is changing the game for Oracle databases, and how we think about performance tuning,” said Ault.

    “Whereas in the past a poorly-designed database might take six months and $500,000 in consulting costs to repair, simply installing SSD can mean the database immediately runs more than ten times faster for a fraction of the cost of repairing the source code. We wrote the book specifically for DBAs so that they could easily understand the benefits and limitations of SSD in their specific circumstances, and have all the tools they need to benchmark effectively. Any DBA who wants to keep their performance tuning skills relevant will read this book.”

    According to the publisher, Oracle Performance Tuning With Solid State Disk provides a comprehensive guide that enables DBAs to make the transition to SSD successfully and with confidence. By accelerating Oracle databases, applications can handle more transactions, more concurrent users and deliver higher profits and productivity gains.

    “It is a clear and definitive guide for converting existing systems from hard disk to SSD technology and empowers DBAs to make the logical choice of how and when to use SSD. The book provides an in-depth examination of testing methodologies, with clear examples, that DBAs can use to effectively benchmark and improve their own specific databases,” says Rampant Press.

    Mike Ault is an Oracle expert and a prolific author, who has published more than twenty Oracle-related books. He was an Oracle database specialist at Quest Software and has has five Oracle Masters Certificates more than 17 years of experience as an Oracle DBA and consultant.

    He is Oracle guru in residence at Texas Memory Systems, where he oversees Texas Memory Systems’ sponsorship of StatspackAnalyzer.com, a free tool that is popular in the Oracle community.

    As a special introductory promotion, Texas Memory Systems will be giving away a limited number of free copies to visitors to its booth at Oracle Open World 2009 from October 12th through 15th.

  • Canalys Special Report “Smart phone market trends 2009/2010”

    ADVERTORIAL. The mobile industry is pinning its hopes on smart phones as the driver of growth in difficult times. Overall mobile phone shipments are falling, but smart phones are growing and taking an increasing share of the market.

    Companies such as Apple and RIM are seeing increases in demand for their devices, challenging the likes of Nokia, and leading a fundamental shift toward new device form factors and use of mobile applications by consumers and businesses.

    Network operators are struggling to establish the best strategy to open up new revenue streams, while having to manage complex partnerships with strong hardware vendors, as well as other companies that have entered their world with mobile service revenue aspirations of their own, such as Google and Microsoft.

    The Canalys “Smart phone market trends 2009/2010” report pulls together, in a concise format, qualitative analysis of key market trends, top-level market share and shipment estimates for the leading vendors, comparative analysis of vendors’ performance and evaluation of their strengths and weaknesses, and forecasts for future market development.

    “Smart phone market trends 2009/2010” report gives the precise and exhaustive answers to the following questions:

    • Who are the leading smart phone vendors in each region?
    • What impact will application stores have on operators and vendors?
    • How are the different mobile operating systems evolving and why?
    • Which operators have the best smart phone strategies?
    • How will the different regions grow over the next five years?
    • What are the biggest threats to today’s leading smart phone vendors?
    • How can mobile companies make the most of growth in China?
    • What are the implications of a more software-centric mobile ecosystem?
    • What are the key trends in user interfaces and form factors?
    • Where are the key competitive arenas for Google, Apple, RIM, Microsoft, Nokia et al?

    The full report, published in August 2009, is 70 pages and includes supporting definitions and explanation of the research methodologies used, and is only available direct from Canalys – the acknowledged leading market analyst firm in this area.

    Click here to find out more

  • TomTom Presents Car Kit for iPhone

    Biz.News.com reporters navigated to TomTom’s stand at IFA 2009, where Sarah Schweiger, PR Manager for TomTom, gave them a brief introduction to the company: their main markets, competitors and challenges as well as newly released products, including long-expected car kit for iPhone scheduled to ship in the U.S. in October.

  • Buffalo First to Ship USB 3.0 HDD

    After announcing the first to market SuperSpeed USB 3.0 External Hard Disk Drive one week ago, Buffalo now gives the details on availability and prices.

    The DriveStation HD-HXU3, offers SuperSpeed transfer speeds of up to 125MB/s, which is 3-4 times faster than the company’s currently available USB 2.0 drive, and comes in a ranges of sizes, including 500 GB, 1TB and 1.5 TB. 2TB model is planned for later release.

    The HD-HXU3 will be also the first actually usable USB 3.0 HDD to the market, as it will come together with 2-port PCI Expressx1 host controller, which fully supports USB 3.0 connectivity.

    The new Buffalo’s DriveStation is backwards-compatible and will work with all USB 2.0 enabled computers and notebooks, as well as forthcoming USB 3.0 models.

    The drive will hit Japanese shelves in late October for about $225 for 1TB and $284 for 1,5 TB drive. 2TB disk, coming later this year, will cost about $523.

    The first, but still unusable USB 3.0 cables have gone on sale over at USBfever in April. Two weeks ago Freecom announced it would ship USB 3.0 hard drives, the XS 3.0, in mid-November.