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  • Android Market Reaches 40 Million Downloads


    T-Mobile G1 customers have downloaded on average more than 40 applications from Android Market.

    With one million G1s sold that adds up to 40 million downloads in total since the first Android handset was launched six months ago.

    The stats, which come from an interview T-Mobile gave to mocoNews, also show that among T-Mobile customers who’ve purchased a G1 around half traded up from a basic handset.

    Other details include:

    • Approximately 80 per cent of T-Mobile G1 users browse the web on a daily basis
    • The majority of T-Mobile G1 owners use Facebook and Youtube at least once a day and access Wi-Fi on a daily basis
    • Four out of five G1 customers download applications at least once a week

    While the figures pall when compared to the iPhones 500 million plus downloads, but it’s early days for the G1.

  • Blackberry App World Launches, 1,000 Apps Expected in First Week


    Research In Motion (RIM) has launched its application store Blackberry App World in the US, the UK and Canada, with more country launches to follow.

    Unveiled at CTIA 2009 in Las Vegas, the much-anticipated app store for BlackBerry smartphones will offer a mix of personal and business applications, both free and paid.

    RIM will be hoping its platform will be as successful as Apple’s App Store, which has rung up 800 million app downloads since last summer.

    The Canadian company expects approximately 1,000 applications to be posted by partners on BlackBerry App World this week.

    These include popular brands such as Bloomberg, ClearChannel, Lonely Planet, Gameloft, MTV, The New York Times, and World Mate.

    Mike Lazaridis, RIM president and co-CEO, said the BlackBerry platform was used by millions of people.

    He said the new app store will enhance that experience by connecting consumers with developers and carriers.

    "BlackBerry App World aggregates a wide variety of personal and business apps in a way that makes it very easy for consumers to discover and download the apps that suit them while preserving the appropriate IT architecture and controls required by our enterprise customers," he said.

    Among the features on App World are:

    • a "front page carousel" that showcases several applications and lets users browse through featured applications
    • a Top Downloads area that lists the applications most downloaded, by category
    • a keyword search tool for apps
    • user recommendation function – by e-mail, PIN, SMS message, or BlackBerry Messenger
    • My World folder to keep track of downloaded applications

    BlackBerry App World is available for BlackBerry smartphones with a trackball or touchscreen running BlackBerry device software 4.2 or higher.

  • Celio Software Enables Smartphone Apps On PC Screen


    Celio Corp has announced a free beta of REDFLY Mobile Viewer PC software.

    The software allows smartphone users to use their Windows Mobile applications at full size on their PCs.

    It gives access to all of the smartphone’s applications and features via a Windows PC, including the ability to send and receive SMS messages and e-mail in a full-screen window.

    The REDFLY Mobile Viewer works with all current REDFLY-compatible smartphones.

    Users can select from four different resolutions (800×480, 800×600, 1024×600 or 1024×768) to view their smartphone screen in a larger PC window.

  • Transverse Offers Service Providers Open Source-based BSS Solution


    Transverse has announced the availability of the first open source business support solutions (BSS) solution for telecom service providers.

    Chris Couch, chief operations officer at Transverse, said its blee(p) Enterprise Edition offers a telecom back office solution that is flexible and adaptable to the changing needs of service providers.

    It is designed as a fully integrated set of business management services for back office systems.

    Speaking at CTIA 2009 in Las Vegas, he said the new commercial solution gave service providers the benefits of an open source-based BSS solution together with the critical support provided by a commercially backed solution.

    "The result is a high quality, fully supported, carrier-grade BSS solution at a fraction of the price of competitive offerings," he said.

    Last month, Transverse was named in the "Cool Vendors in Telecom Operations Management (TOM) 2009" report by Gartner.

    Couch said blee(p) Enterprise Edition provides several advantages to telecom service providers above and beyond the benefits of the open source-based platform blee(p). These benefits include:

    • Service-level agreements
    • On-site or virtual training and continuing education services on blee(p)
    • Production and developer support staffed by experts 24×7
    • Integrated third-party software
    • Indemnification on existing blee(p) code
    • GPL exclusions for integrated applications
    • In addition to being open source, blee(p) is a web-based, real-time, telecom back office support system.

    Jim Messer, CEO of Transverse, said it is constructed as a service-oriented architecture (SOA) based product and provides over 2100 individual telecom related business management services.

    Utilizing SOA, and the blee(p) configuration framework, end-to-end telecom business solutions can be assembled in days, instead of weeks or months.
    "Until now, service providers have had to face significant CAPEX and OPEX costs in order to radically change and upgrade their back office architecture to support new business models," he said.

    "By leveraging open source and technologies that help end vendor lock-in and drastically reduce the total cost of ownership of back-office systems, service providers can proactively move toward new service offerings."

    Messer said these new service offerings, together with the adoption of new business models, gave them the competitive edge they need to succeed with significantly reduced financial risk.

    Pricing for blee(p) Enterprise Edition is based on the number of subscriber lines per number of installed systems it is used to manage.

  • AnySource Media: Simple UI is Key To Internet-enabled HDTV

    INTERVIEW: Mike Harris, CEO of AnySource Media, talks to hdtv.biz-news about his company’s Internet-enabled TV platform that will start appearing in HDTV sets in the second half of 2009.

    Offering consumers dozens of "virtual channels" that can be viewed on their HDTVs alongside traditional TV networks – without requiring a separate box or complicated wiring – seems like a great idea.

    As does the ability to easily navigate the Internet content using a standard remote, and the fact that all of this isn’t going to bump up the price of a new wide-screen set.

    So where’s the catch?

    Well, if you listen to Mike Harris, CEO of AnySource Media (ASM), there isn’t one.

    His company provides a turnkey Internet-enabled TV platform, called the Internet Video Navigator (IVN), to silicon companies and HDTV manufacturers.

    He told hdtv.biz-news that ASM is currently working with the makers of some high-volume, mass market HDTV brands to integrate the IVN client software directly into their sets.

    While he couldn’t name names, the first ASM-equipped products will launch in the US in the second half of 2009 and will then be rolled out in Europe and Asia in 2010.

    No-Cost Embedded Software

    ASM’s embedded IVN software allows TV viewers to navigate Internet video, selecting sites and jumping to specific videos, or sit back and watch videos like a traditional broadcast experience.

    Mike Harris, CEO
    AnySource Media

    Where ASM scores highly is that its software is simply layered on top of chip technology already in HDTV sets.

    Harris said this gives it a big cost advantage – while providing manufacturers with a great opportunity to differentiate their sets in a competitive market.

    Since the intention is to get the platform into the market in "high volume, very quickly", ASM is offering set manufacturers the software licence for free.

    He said with no additional cost for the HDTV makers, the price of the television sets isn’t affected.

    Content Providers

    ASM’s full list of content providers is not yet available, however the company showed 80 different partner channels at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show.

    Harris said the idea is to provide complementary content rather than trying to be an alternative to satellite or cable providers.

    "What we are offering is a high quality experience at no additional cost, which is very easy to use with a standard remote and is very scaleable," he said.
    "The TV continues to grow even as you own it."

    Key to this is the idea that it is "TV on TV" not "Internet on TV". For this reason, ASM has focused on major features such as video quality and channel change speed – which Harris said is almost as quick as a TV experience.

    "It’s about sitting back and relaxing, watching content on a big screen when you have more time to spend surfing for content and discovering new things," he said.

    To make all this possible on low-cost embedded hardware much of the processing burden has been moved to the IVN Data Center.

    The back-end data center aggregates and streams content from providers to the IVN user interface on the television.

    Tailored Content

    Harris said the mix of channels and content depends on the set manufacturer – and on where the user lives.

    So when consumers buy an HDTV a certain list of channels will be available immediately.

    "That list can be modified by the consumer, so if they like sports channels they can put them at the top of the list – or they can remove channels altogether," he said.

    "New channels can appear all the time, without any change to the device being required.

    "We have taken a very scaleable approach."

    Harris said the result was that a particular HDTV, in a particular region would have its own unique look and feel.

    How that was arranged was all taken care of in the backend.

    "An HDTV in Germany will have a different list of channels to one, say, in the US," he said.

    As well as issues such as language and cultural preferences, the fact some content sites are geo-targeted will also influence channel listings.

    Targeted Advertising

    For ASM to make its money the IVN platform includes a targeted advertising and user management system, managed at the IVN Data Center.

    Harris said that AnySource’s method of monetizing content depended on the given market.

    "We have approached advertising in a way that makes it work for the content providers," he said.

    "The service is free for consumers."

    So AnySource doesn’t interfere with content providers’ existing business models, which means if they are ad-supported they keep all the revenues.

    "What we have, through our user interface, is additional ad inventory," said Harris. "There are spaces for ads during the browsing period. That’s where we generate our ad revenue."

    In addition, AnySource also receives commission for any paid content transmissions.

    HDTV And Beyond

    In March, ASM announced it had secured USD $3.2 million in additional funding.

    As well as being used to bring the platform to commercialization and increase the number of content providers, it will fund the development of new technologies that will provide long-term flexibility for viewing online video on HDTVs.

    While ASM is concentrating on HDTVs at present, Harris said the platform had been built for a wide range of devices.

    He said they had had discussions with Blu-ray, MID and mobile makers about future possible applications for the software.

    "What we have built on the cloud doesn’t know whether it’s dealing with a TV or whatever," he said.

    "It just looks at the devices capability and the back-end makes available whatever it needs."

    There’s no doubt that content quality will be a key determing factor in the race to bring the Internet to the TV.

    But it also has to be content that is easy to access. ASM would appear to have that issue firmly in hand.

  • Virtual PBX And Gizmo5 Announce Business Voip Service


    Virtual PBX and Gizmo5 have announced a new collaboration that they claim offers a business phone solution with the industry’s deepest feature set at a price level well below current standards.

    Built on an open-system VoIP peering platform, the new service combines the products of both companies.

    As part of the announcement, Virtual PBX has launched iVPBX, a new product that provides customers with unlimited inbound calling and no per-minute fees at a price of just under USD $10 per seat.

    The company estimates this is about one-fourth to one-fifth the cost of most competing plans.

    Gizmo5 clients who use the new iVPBX product can send calls by IP directly to their Gizmo phones at no cost.

    Virtual PBX’s deeper relationship with Gizmo5 follows on from its open VoIP peering technology announced last November.

    Virtual PBX client companies using the service typically have one main business number for clients to call.

    Virtual PBX takes those calls, answers them with a "virtual" attendant, and then delivers them to employees using any kind of phone, in any location.

    The solution enables small firms and those with distributed employees to portray a professional phone image and get top-end features – without the expense or maintenance hassles of purchasing their own telecommunications hardware.

    Traditional Virtual PBX pricing plans include a varying number of free minutes with a price of 4.4 to 6.5 cents per minute for additional usage, according to a statement from Virtual PBX.

    It said with the new iVPBX product, available now, calls coming in on a local number and sent to a Gizmo5 phone will have no per-minute fee for unlimited use.

    By adding the Virtual PBX service, business users of Gizmo5 gain all the advantages of a high-end PBX, such as an auto-attendant, transferring calls between users, and routing calls to departments though ACD queues.

    Paul Hammond, CEO of Virtual PBX, said the new iVPBX product gives users a very low-cost plan with unlimited usage.

    "And the combination of Virtual PBX and Gizmo5 delivers the best of both worlds at a fraction of the cost of typical hosted IP-PBX offerings," he said.

  • Is Netflix Price Rise A Set-Back For Blu-ray?


    The price for Netflix’s Blu-ray subscribers is going up again on April 27th.

    The increase translates into an extra USD $4 a month for BD users opting for standard three-at-a-time plans.

    While Netflix is arguably justified in charging more to finance its rapidly expanded – and more costly to buy – Blu-ray stock of over 1,300 titles, it doesn’t help the high-def format’s image.

    Already seen as an expensive option compared to DVDs and other media, its goal of mainstream adoption is still bumping along.

    Around 10 per cent of Netflix’s renters currently opt for Blu-ray, so the appetite is there.

    Whether those consumers – and future ones too – will be put off by the price rises of around 20 per cent by the movies-by-mail company remains to be seen.

  • HD-Capable Device Shipments To Triple by 2012


    As HD becomes the global video standard shipments of high-definition set-top boxes (STBs), camcorders, DVD players and video-game consoles are expected to triple from 2008 to 2012, according to iSuppli.

    Shipments of HD-capable equipment in these categories will rise to 202 million units by 2012, up from 68.9 million in 2008.

    The researchers forecast that by 2012, 52.9 per cent of STBs, camcorders, DVD players and game consoles shipped will be HD-capable, up from 21.6 per cent in 2008.

    Randy Lawson, senior analyst for DTV and display electronics at iSuppli, said that for the last 20 years, HD video has been the holy grail for consumer electronics OEMs, as well as for avid home theater fans around the world.

    "The high-tech industry’s efforts to provide HD service to every home now are finally coming to fruition," he said.

    "This has resulted in an explosion of shipments of consumer-electronics devices that support HD video, from new Blu-ray DVD players to ultra-thin LCD HDTVs, and even some portable media players."

    This is reflected in a surge in the availability of HD content.

    In some mature television markets this has reached the stage where hundreds of high-definition channels now are being offered by the entire spectrum of television service providers – from cable, to satellite, to terrestrial and to even to telecom – due to the rollout of Internet protocol television (IPTV) services.

    iSuppli points to the rapidly growing list of HD content suppliers, along with the fast-rising adoption rates seen for HDTVs and STBs, as a clear indication that HD video transmission and delivery are becoming major motivators for consumer adoption of newer technology television displays and playback/recording equipment.

    Added to this is the fact that the broadcast TV market is rapidly shifting to all-digital television formats, further raising the incentive for the inclusion of HD support in consumer-electronics devices.

  • 3D Heading For Home Screens – Likely To Be Games First


    More than 10 per cent of TVs sold worldwide could have 3D capability by 2011, rising to 16 per cent or 2.8bn sets by 2015.

    That’s the prediction of research by Screen Digest, which suggests that technological advances mean today’s 3D cinema viewing experience will soon be possible at home.

    The researchers’ forecasts are, however, dependent on a unifying standard emerging that works across all technologies.

    If that fails to materialise, Display Search downgrades its estimates to 3D-capable sets accounting for just three per cent of sales by 2015 – or 500m units.

    At present the most reliable technology will require consumers to invest in a new TV and wear special 3D glasses.

    But Screen Digest believes that autostereoscopic technology will eventually become most popular as it has one major advantage: no glasses.

    Stressing that the 3D market is in its infancy and that mass uptake is a long way off, the report says that 3D requires twice the broadcast bandwidth of today’s two-dimensional viewing experience.

    For this reason, Screen Digest expects Blu-ray Disc to provide the main method of distribution, as its hi-def content capacity bypasses the bandwidth issue altogether.

    Since Screen 3D films attract a premium of up to 50 per cent on cinema tickets, the researchers note that Hollywood Studios have a vested interest in getting 3D entertainment into homes.

    Marie Bloomfield, analyst at Screen Digest, said since no-one wants a costly replay of the hi-def disc format war, industry associations are already working together to establish a viable roadmap to make that happen.

    She said that due to higher bandwidth and incremental production costs, when it does come to the small screen, 3D TV programming will be the reserve of paying customers only.

    "What 3D offers the Studios and pay TV operators is an opportunity to charge a premium for content – perhaps even more so than high definition," she said.

    "But as it is emerging in the middle of a recession, the home 3D market is in a Catch 22 situation.

    "Consumers will not be persuaded to invest in new equipment to experience 3D until there is enough content; and content production will not ramp up until there is a significant audience.

    "3D in the home will therefore be a slow burn, remaining a niche business for the foreseeable future."

    3D movie production has increased rapidly.

    In 2008, there were seven films; in 2009 there will be 17 and a further 28 are due to be released in 2010.

    Compared with live action, animated films are much easier to adapt to 3D and Disney and DreamWorks Animation have been quick to grasp the opportunity.

    Together they account for more than half of the 3D film release slate.

    It is more challenging to produce 3D TV programming on broadcasting budgets, yet nonetheless several broadcasters have launched trials around sporting events.

    In conclusion, Screen Digest predicts that it may be 3D games and not movies or TV that arrives in the home first.

    Gaming is an early adopter market, consoles and software could be upgraded relatively painlessly and gamers are more willing to adopt peripherals such as glasses, all of which make it an ideal home entry point for 3D technology.

  • Skype Announces iPhone App,Video Calling Coming Soon?


    STORY UPDATED: see below

    Skype is now available for the iPhone – and will be coming to BlackBerry in May.

    The VoIP app on the iPhone will only work over Wi-Fi and not 3G.

    It will allow iPhone subscribers to use phone numbers in their existing iPhone address book – without the need for duplicate lists.

    As always, it allows free calls between Skype users and charges for calls to landlines or mobiles.

    The free application began appearing in the app store early on Tuesday.

    UPDATE: Since being released on Tuesday it has emerged that Skype on iPhone does works over 3G, despite being intended only for use with WiFi.

    Users report it working over the 3G data connection if the beta 3.0 firmware is being run.

    Since VoIP over the 3G cellular is clearly forbidden in the SDK rules, it’s obviously due to a bug on 3.0 that it works.

    This raises the question of how long it will be before Apple closes the hole?

    But also, how did was the app "approved" and certified by for the App Store without first "testing" if Skype would work on the 3G connection?