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Tag: ios

  • Sales Below Expectations For Nokia Lumia 800

    Nokia Lumia 800, although very promising at the time of launch, fails to stop the Finnish manufacturer from its sharp decline in the smart devices market.

    Despite efforts made by Nokia to promote their new model Lumia 800 and the encouraging sales figures announced at the time of launch, the reality seems to be different at all. The direction taken by Nokia Lumia 800 is actually moving toward sales far below the Finnish manufacturer's expectations.

    According to analyst James Faucett at Pacific Crest, if current trends maintain, sales figures for the Lumia 800 will not exceed 500,000 pieces sold, four times less than expected by Nokia.

    Given that the design team has done their homework, creating a very successful handset, which should easily convince the audience it is addressed, the only culprit remains its operating system – Windows Phone 7.5, still regarded with suspicion by many users.

    Nokia can only hope not to end the year with disastrous financial results. They only have the winter shopping season, which could raise again the sales figures.

    Unfortunately, at least for now, the partnership between Nokia and Microsoft does not seem to give the results foreseen by the CEO Stephen Elop, putting the company in disadvantage by using a too-new operating system, with many limitations artificially imposed and unable to convince in front of the competition presented by Google's Android and Apple's iOS.

    Despite the optimism shown by Nokia, the success that Lumia 800 enjoys in the UK cannot be entirely attributed to the design team. Orange UK recently launched a very aggressive campaign to promote Nokia’s handsets, rewarding about half of customers who have pre-ordered the phone with an xBox console completely free. As expected, the offer was very useful, even if it’s just a low-end version of the xBox console.

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  • Nokia N9, Love at Second Sight

    Nokia N9, the charismatic smartphone with MeeGo OS is one of those gadgets that after an initial period of time conquers you irremediably thanks to its outstanding design and its fresh and different operating system.

    You cannot feel a certain sadness at the thought that the N9 will get a limited release and the promising MeeGo will be placed somewhere on a shelf where it will be getting dusty.

    Slim and stylish
    Nokia N9 has a minimalistic casing, with a thickness of only 12 mm and a curved AMOLED ClearBlack screen of 3.9 inches, having a resolution of 854 x 480 pixels. Its colorful menu icons, displayed by the splendid screen, perfectly contrast with the black matte case.

    Nokia had the kindness to include in package a case designed to protect the casing from scratches. Its casing impresses primarily by impairing the phone’s design, going almost unnoticed, which unfortunately cannot be said for many smartphones.

    Fresh air
    Nokia N9 uses MeeGo 1.2 Harmattan, the most refined version of the operating system developed by Nokia in collaboration with Intel. For those familiar with Android’s key layout or with the iPhone’s Home key, the no-button interaction used by N9 will definitely be an interesting experience.

    After using intensively the Android OS and the iOS, MeeGo seems a breeze of freshness. Vivid icons, fluid animations and a very modern look dominate the N9 operating system's interface. An example is the clock – in order to set the alarm you have to turn the two disks associated with hours and minutes.

    The menu and the applications are working excellent, despite the fact that the hardware used by Nokia N9 is not very impressive. The phone has a Cortex A8 processor at 1GHz, but is helped by 1GB RAM and a GPU PowerVR SGX530. The internal memory is 16 or 64 GB.

    Camera
    Upon hearing the news that Nokia will launch the N9, many fans were expecting the smartphone to have an even better camera than the one on N8. Things are not quite so, the Finnish giant preferring a different approach for the N9. The phone has an 8-megapixel camera with a smaller sensor than in N8 but with the same excellent Carl Zeiss optics.

    N9 also offers 720p video shooting, something not very impressive considering that we already have plenty of smartphones with 1080p. Videos are also decent, but nothing remarkable.

    Camera interface is complex, providing access to a multitude of options, from setting the ISO exposure, geo-tagging, formatting or selecting one of the six different scenes.

    Applications
    The ecosystem of applications should be the Achilles heel for Nokia N9, taking into account the somewhat limited offer from Ovi Store, but things are not so. You will not have access to the hundreds of thousands of applications in the App Store, but you will find applications mainly covering the needs list and also some top games. You have access to dedicated applications for Facebook, Twitter, multimedia playback applications or games like Angry Birds or NFS Shift.

    Nokia N9 supports a wide range of files, both office and multimedia. With the Documents application you can open text files or PDFs, while the video player supports MKVs. No shortage of navigation applications Maps and Drive or the Ovi Music service.

    Nokia N9 shows those who criticized the lack of innovation of the Finnish giant that the flame has not yet been extinguished and that Nokia can still be a milestone in the mobile world. The problem is that Nokia N9 arrived a year too late, has a pretty high price and is not enjoying the deserved attention.

    We will probably see phones with hardware and design similar with N9’s during the Nokia World event, but that will run Windows Phone Mango.

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  • According to Nokia, Windows Phone 7 Excels Against the Android and iOS Popularity

    Nokia President Chris Weber has come up with a greatest insight into the Nokia’s latest strategy in an interview with VentureBeat. He made an astonishing comment saying that interfaces and app-based models such as Android and iOS will “outdate” soon.

    Nokia recently associated with Microsoft for its Windows Phone 7 mobile platform and coming up with some latest smartphone models pretty soon to regain its dominance like earlier. Nokia is seriously concentrating on a new strategy to gain upper hand over the currently popular Android and iOS. The new strategy of the upcoming smartphones from Nokia will be unique through arranging everything around the contacts unlike its competitors, which are based on the navigation among various apps.

    Windows Phone 7 coming up with a new interaction procedure known as “Live tiles and Hubs”. This feature offers all the key contacts along with mode of communication through dynamic tiles, which alters display as soon as a contact posts an update. Also, contacting someone is enabled through various options just through tapping, which will return back with various communication options including calling, Facebook, Twitter, email and many more. Definitely, this kind of approach is quite unique and away from the present popular mobile operating systems.

    The streamlined communication feature arranged in the Windows Phone 7 OS is quite novice and unlike apps based phones. Nokia thinking that this can gain back the throne like earlier. In fact, the mentioned feature success is mainly dependent on the mobile phone hardware. Perhaps, Nokia can succeed well to arrange require hardware for these feature through their devices, but other manufacturers such as LG, Samsung and HTC will think about this as they’re all already well associated with Android for their smartphones.

    Nokia is very well panning to make maximum out of Windows Phone 7 and planning for biggest marketing campaign for all their WP7 based upcoming smartphones. According to Weber’s latest interview, the upcoming smartphones will be available in the U.S. market “in volume” in 2012.

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  • Adobe Facilitated Android, iOS and BlackBerry with its Updates for Flash Builder and Flex

    Adobe today released much awaited updates to its Flex 4.5 and Flash Builder 4.5 software. The new release enables developers to create cross-platform apps successfully for iOS, Android and BlackBerry.

    This release will facilitate functionality of the adobe Framework, which was released in this year April. In fact, Adobe framework support was extended alone for Android from the day of its launch and these latest updates enabled this facility for rest of the operating systems as promised by adobe earlier.

    Adobe introduced several other applications along with these updates that were built through their latest software and informed that these applications will be available soon for the three app stores Itunes, BlackBerry App World and Android Market. There are few games in this list to be introduced such as Mr. Mixit and Pyramix, Conqu-a task management tool, Muni Tracker for San Francisco’s Public transport system and Netflix Queue Manager by UnitedMindset.

    The announced updates are credited successfully with many productivity improvements according to the Adobe. Also, it is informed that these updates will enable Flash Builder 4.5 with the best practice code templates for developers along with code completion and code generation features. These additions will definitely create significant acceleration for the Flex and some more Action script applications. These things will deployed by adobe through Adobe AIR. It is expected that this AIR will support more than 200 million platforms by this year ending.

    This latest updates release from Adobe got significant influence over the Apple. Earlier Apple imposed a ban over the usage of the third-party development tools and that left many developers away from the Adobe’s Flash, Sun’s Java and Microsoft Silverlight and some more. Now, the latest updates from Adobe in the favor of iOS is lifted another special environment for developers to develop apps with more ease and comfort.

  • What You Should Keep in Mind When Buying a Smartphone

    Buying a smartphone is more difficult than it seems. Often, after you do finally purchase it, you feel like you didn’t take the best. And even if it is not so complicated it’s still a frustrating process. The guys at Business Intelligence did a survey in which they asked buyers what are they taking into account when buying a phone.

    On the 5th place came out that many of those who want to buy a new smartphone think of how difficult it’s for them to move the context from one phone to another – all the messages, pictures, calendar, settings, accounts, says one of the authors of the survey.

    He added that for doing this you need to consider the phones you use for transfer, and if you’re still in this chapter, you’d better get something to eat as it will take a while until you’ll succeed. So if you want to know more … Google it.

    In the 4th place in the top things to keep in mind is the mobile operator. This rule is valid in any country, a telephone buyer, especially when buying the phone under subscription, has to choose the operator depending on family and friends.

    The selection of applications is also a priority for consumers, so it is considered "worthy" of a 3rd place. That’s because our phone is so smart depending on how many applications we put on it. But do not forget that the Internet, which all the smart phones can access it, is the ultimate application.

    The phone features are a very important element to be considered by customers. Slider or not, battery lifetime, screen size, storage capacity or Flash support – all these are factors which consumers take into account. The leaders of this survey warn not to fall into the trap of the camera. It does not matter how many megapixels the camera has, so think efficient.

    The most important thing to consider is the platform. For the most of those surveyed it matters if the phone is running on Android, Windows Phone, Web OS, iOS – basically, the operating system dictates, in many cases, what is the best phone. The way icons are placed, how you interact with it matters a lot, because if you do not like, then you bought the phone for nothing.

    In the survey I mentioned above, surprisingly, price was not one of the most important characteristics that consumers take into account when buying a smartphone.

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  • Apple iOS 5 May be Credited with Widgets and Revamped Notifications

    The latest version of Apple’s iOS – iOS 5 – is almost ready and planned to be introduced at this year’s Worldwide Developers Conference. It is already rumored that the upcoming OS is featuring many advancements along with widgets and revamped notifications.

    Last year June was the first time to rumors floats all around about the improved notifications for the latest iOS. This was started through Apple’s recruiting a designer to create notification system for Plam’s WebOS. The widget issue came into light when Apple started filing patent for the always-in-sync widget for touchscreen devices.

    Some sources already revealed that the Apple is more into pushing journalists for the introduction of iOS 5 and planning this announcement in a big way. It is also informed that the latest iOS changes are designed to make up the hardware deficiencies and this will be the highlight of the software announcement from Apple.

    It is also presumed that the Apple may make announcement about cloud storage for their both operating systems iOS and Mac OS X  Lion. In fact, Apple blog mentioned in March that they may not release cloud-based iOS 5 until this fall.

    Earlier we mentioned about the Nuance deal with Apple for Voice Recognition. Surprisingly, some of the reliable sources confirmed that the “voice control” feature with the latest Apple mobile operating system got nothing to do with the licensing deal with Nuance.

    It looks like Apple is not interested in taking chances as the current feature is doing pretty well with the customer base. Also, iOS 5 is still under test, and perhaps planned changes might take place at a later stage. Also, it seems to be the planned “Voice Navigation” feature through Nuance Technologies might have taken a back seat and some core aspects might have considered for this time.

    In fact, ignoring “Voice Navigation” feature definitely will be a greatest disappointment for the Apple’s customer base as most of the Android based smartphones overtaking the iPhone success just because of this only feature. Already many experts are clearly indicating this feature as a major drawback for the popular iPhone to maintain its ruling in the market. Everyone expected this feature from the latest iOS 5, but looks like still further wait is needed for this feature.

  • Android To Become the Most Popular OS by the End of 2011

    Worldwide smartphone sales will reach 468 million units in 2011, a 57.7 percent increase from 2010, according to Gartner. By the end of 2011, Android will move to become the most popular operating system worldwide and will build on its strength to account for 49 percent of the smartphone market by 2012.

    According to the report, sales of open OS devices will account for 26 percent of all mobile handset device sales in 2011, and are expected to surpass the 1 billion mark by 2015, when they will account for 47 percent of the total mobile device market.

    “By 2015, 67 percent of all open OS devices will have an average selling price of $300 or below, proving that smartphones have been finally truly democratized,” said Roberta Cozza, principal analyst at Gartner.

    “As vendors delivering Android-based devices continue to fight for market share, price will decrease to further benefit consumers”, Cozza said. “Android’s position at the high end of the market will remain strong, but its greatest volume opportunity in the longer term will be in the mid- to low-cost smartphones, above all in emerging markets.”

    Gartner predicts that Apple’s iOS will remain the second biggest platform worldwide through 2014 despite its share deceasing slightly after 2011. This reflects Gartner’s underlying assumption that Apple will be interested in maintaining margins rather than pursuing market share by changing its pricing strategy. This will continue to limit adoption in emerging regions. iOS share will peak in 2011, with volume growth well above the market average. This is driven by increased channel reach in key mature markets like the U.S. and Western Europe.

    Research In Motion’s share over the forecast period will decline, reflecting the stronger competitive environment in the consumer market, as well as increased competition in the business sector. Gartner has factored in RIM’s migration from BlackBerry OS to QNX which is expected in 2012. Analysts said this transition makes sense because RIM can create a consistent experience going from smartphones to tablets with a single developer community and — given that QNX as a platform brings more advanced features than the classic BlackBerry OS — it can enable more competitive smartphone products.

    Gartner predicts that Nokia will push Windows Phone well into the mid-tier of its portfolio by the end of 2012, driving the platform to be the third largest in the worldwide ranking by 2013. Gartner has revised its forecast of Windows Phone’s market share upward, solely by virtue of Microsoft’s alliance with Nokia. Although this is an honorable performance it is considerably less than what Symbian had achieve in the past underlying the upward battle that Nokia has to face.

    Gartner analysts said new device types will widen ecosystems. “The growth in sales of media tablets expected in 2011 and future years will widen the ecosystems that open OS communications devices have created. This will, by and large, function more as a driver than an inhibitor for sales of open OS devices,” said Carolina Milanesi, research vice president at Gartner.

    “Consumers who already own an open OS communications device will be drawn to media tablets and more often than not, to media tablets that share the same OS as their smartphone,” Milanesi said. “This allows consumers to be able to share the same experience across devices as well as apps, settings or game scores. At the same time, tablet users who don’t own a smartphone could be prompted to adopt one to be able to share the experience they have on their tablets.”

  • Android Overtakes iOS in Latest Mobile Mix Report

    According to Millennial Media’s Mobile Mix Index, for the first time Android surpassed iOS as the largest smartphone operating system on Millennial Media’s network last month, with an 8% month-over-month increase and 46% of the impression share. iOS represented 32% of the impression share.

    In 2011, Millennial Media anticipates that we’ll continue to see increased platform diversity with not only Android, but RIM and Windows Phone 7 applying pressure on iOS.

    “This prediction once again stresses the importance of advertising and developing across platforms,” said Mack McKelvey, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Millennial Media.

    Here are a few additional highlights from the December issue:
    • Samsung maintained the number two position in the Top 15 Manufacturers for the third consecutive month. The Samsung Code entered the Top 30 Mobile Devices for the first time in December and is the only Windows OS device in the Top 30 Mobile Device Ranking.

    • HTC claimed the number three position in the Top 15 Manufacturers – with a 9% growth month-over-month. There is a direct correlation with this increase and HTC having the highest number of devices (nine) in our Top 30 Mobile Device Ranking, including the debut of four new devices on our network: HTC Nexus One (Passion), HTC Evo, HTC Droid Incredible, and the HTC Desire.

    • Travel and Vacation app impressions doubled quarter-over-quarter. Apps in this category have evolved to bring online capabilities to the mobile platform (e.g., reservations, check-in, boarding passes, travel updates, etc.). The double digit quarterly growth shows that mobile consumers found value in staying connected through their mobile devices as they traveled this holiday season.

    • Music and Entertainment apps maintained the number three position quarter-over-quarter with 22% of the impression share. Television apps are the fastest growing sub-category with 259% growth in impression share quarter-over-quarter.

    • Touch Screen devices grew 10% month-over-month, with approximately 57% share of impressions in the December Device Input Mix. This growth can be attributed to the increased penetration of Smartphones with this input method.

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  • Google Android Reaches #2 Spot among Smartphone Platforms

    comScore has released data from the comScore MobiLens service, reporting key trends in the U.S. mobile phone industry during the three month average period ending November 2010. After several months of strong growth, Google Android captured the #2 ranking among smartphone platforms with 26.0 percent of U.S. smartphone subscribers.

    The report ranked the leading mobile original equipment manufacturers and smartphone operating system platforms in the U.S. according to their share of current mobile subscribers ages 13 and older, and reviewed the most popular activities and content accessed via the subscriber’s primary mobile phone. The November report found Samsung to be the top handset manufacturer overall with 24.5 percent market share, while RIM led among smartphone platforms with 33.5 percent market share.

    OEM Market Share

    For the three month average period ending in November, 234 million Americans ages 13 and older used mobile devices. Device manufacturer Samsung ranked as the top OEM with 24.5 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers, up 0.9 percentage points from the three month period ending in August. LG ranked second with 20.9 percent share, followed by Motorola (17.0 percent), RIM (8.8 percent) and Nokia (7.2 percent).

    Smartphone Platform Market Share

    According to the report, 61.5 million people in the U.S. owned smartphones during the three months ending in November, up 10 percent from the preceding three-month period, as RIM led with 33.5 percent market share of smartphones. After several months of strong growth, Google Android captured the #2 ranking among smartphone platforms in November with 26.0 percent of U.S. smartphone subscribers. Apple accounted for 25.0 percent of smartphone subscribers (up 0.8 percentage points), followed by Microsoft with 9.0 percent and Palm with 3.9 percent.

    Mobile Content Usage

    comScore finds that in November, 67.1 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers used text messaging on their mobile device, up 0.5 percentage points versus the prior three month period, while browsers were used by 35.3 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers (up 0.8 percentage points). Subscribers who used downloaded applications comprised 33.4 percent of the mobile audience, representing an increase of 1.1 percentage points. Accessing of social networking sites or blogs increased 1.0 percentage points, representing 23.5 percent of mobile subscribers. Playing games attracted 22.6 percent of the mobile audience while listening to music attracted 15.0 percent.

     

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  • Gartner: Android to Become No. 2 Worldwide Mobile OS in 2010

    The worldwide mobile operating system market will be dominated by Symbian and Android, as the two OSs will account for 59.8 percent of mobile OS sales by 2014, according to Gartner.

    The research firm predicts that Symbian will remain at the top of Gartner’s worldwide OS ranking due to Nokia‘s volume and the push into more mass market price points. However, by the end of the forecast period, the No. 1 spot will be contested with Android, which will be at a very similar share level.

    According to Gartner, communication service providers’ marketing and vendor support for Android-based smartphones will drive the platform to become the second-largest platform, following Symbian, by year-end 2010. This is almost two years earlier than Gartner predicted a year ago.

    "The worldwide mobile OS market is dominated by four players: Symbian, Android, Research In Motion and iOS," said Roberta Cozza, principal research analyst at Gartner.

    "Launches of updated operating systems — such as Apple iOS 4, BlackBerry OS 6, Symbian 3 and Symbian 4, and Windows Phone 7 — will help maintain strong growth in smartphones in 2H10 and 2011 and spur innovation. However, we believe that market share in the OS space will consolidate around a few key OS providers that have the most support from CSPs and developers and strong brand awareness with consumer and enterprise customers," she said.

    Gartner expects manufacturers such as Samsung to launch many new budget Android devices in 2H10 that will drive Android into mass market segments. Other players, such as Sony Ericsson, LG and Motorola, will follow a similar strategy. This trend should help Android become the top OS in North America by the end of 2010.

    "CSPs and mobile device manufacturers alike will need to revisit their platform strategies and balance the need to pursue platforms with the highest current demand against the need to maintain differentiation with unique devices," Cozza said. "CSPs will likely reduce the number of platforms they offer, to reduce their support costs and clarify their propositions to market."

    Gartner predicts that by 2014, open-source platforms will continue to dominate more than 60 percent of the market for smartphones. Single-source platforms, such as Apple’s iOS and Research In Motion’s OS, will increase in unit terms, but their growth rate will be below market average and not enough to sustain share increase. Windows Phone will be relegated to sixth place behind MeeGo in Gartner’s worldwide OS ranking by 2014.

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