We have talk in-depth about the need for HULU to move to a tangible subscription model, and its finally here with Hulu Plus

Hulu Plus will be available soon and currently under invite only status for $9.99 per month and will give you access to every episode of current TV shows from ABC, NBC, Fox and access to past library of over 2,000 episodes from classic TV shows of the past. You will also get shows in HD if available in 720p.

You will also be able to Hulu Plus on the road with with an Apple, iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad.  Samsung, Sony and Vizio Tvs and Blu-Ray players will support it and now gaming console are getting in the mix with support for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 coming as well.

Titans’ Turf Wars Hurt Us All

“Have you seen what’s happening out there? Have you even bothered to look?” – Andromeda/Alexa Davalos – Clash of the Titans, 2010 (Warner Bros)

Maybe people like Jobs and Schmidt aren’t omnipotent gods, but don’t tick them off.

Adobe insulted Steve back in ’96 when they helped Gates first and wouldn’t do a special version of software for the lowly Mac.

Now Jobs looked down to the apps developers and said, “They need to be reminded of the order of things…”

BAM!!! he eliminated Flash from their iPhone connection and wouldn’t let it on his tablet.

Of course, he gave a good reason…their stuff is buggy and crashes (a Mac crashes???…OMG!!!

The Titans can scuffle in the stratosphere, but when they get serious, it makes things miserable for mere mortals.

1984

Jobs started his rise with an ad.

1984 — The Apple only paid once to play their Think Different ad on a Super Bowl Sunday years ago, but it appeared millions of times since and still lives in the virtual world of the Web.   The theme?  Don’t mindlessly follow the crowd…hhmmm.  Source – Apple

Told everyone to “Think Different.”

For years, life for the Titans was good.

They’d show us something new, hot, sexy…we’d emote over it and buy it.

Each Titan had his/her own turf.

Things were so smooth, Steve invited Eric over for board meetings.

Eric was making a ton of money selling cloud clicks, ads.

Steve was making a ton selling things.

First, he reinvented the MP3 player, called it an iPod, added a store.  Sold millions of players…sold a gazillion songs…took out the RIAA.

Then, he reinvented the phone with all the trimmings.

He even allowed mortals to build apps he’d sell for them.

Beyond the Phone – Far from the first smartphone, Apple’s iPhone refreshed the mundane phone call on-the-go experience, taking mobile communications, sharing, enjoyment to a new level.  In less than two years, the new breed of smartphone has placed tremendous strain on service providers’ ability to keep pace with consumer demands.  Improvements – and changes – are in the wind, but it will require new payment plans.

There was an iPhone explosion – an estimated 50 million units sold, 200,000 apps available (100 flatulation, one Pulitzer prize  – finally – apps), six billion downloads.

That’s a big chunk of profit for Apple.

Schmidt took notes in the board meetings.

Mobile kingdom Titans said kids were getting their mobile device earlier (9-1/2 vs. 10 last year – Nielsen Mobile Insights).

Schmidt noticed they were sending an average of 100 text messages a day (Pew Research) – more clicks to count, more ads to slip in.

Steve heard Eric had been poking around the Apple labs and had actually listened to some of his ideas.

Jobs was not pleased!

Not a Happy Titan – If Schmidt had been content with racking up billions by tracking user clicks and selling ads, he might still be on the Apple Board.   But Google’s decision to offer a smartphone, add Android apps stores and now help competitors introduce tablets, did not sit well with the Titan of One Infinity Circle…not at all.

Schmidt figured it couldn’t be too hard to make an iPhone knockoff and use Google’s own OS.

Android phones sell O.K., but the gPhone?

As Solon said, “Not exactly confidence inspiring…”

Steve needed another storefront profit center, so he decreed the redesign of the iPod Touch as something new, breathtaking…

New Species

An eBook…MID (mobile internet device)…pretty smartbook…kinda’ a tablet computer…

Bigger, Better Something – With his usual flair and amid a lot of serious doubt, Jobs introduced the overgrown iPod Touch (but totally different), the iPad.  The Titan had expended a lot of energy telling you how easy it was to enjoy your content and other stuff on your iPhone, but this is even better.  Millions agreed and touchscreen suppliers are hustling to improve production yields as other Titans rush their versions to market.

TaDa…Brilliant!

After more than a half million were sold in five days, 3500 (non-flash) apps were made available.

The Titan still had his magic…3.5 million app downloads, 600,000 eBooks.

Analysts believe Apple will sell one million iPads by June, more than five million by the end of the year.

No one can really figure out where the sucker fits in the marketplace, but the “category” is gonna be HUGE!!!!

New Category – A surprise to almost everyone – including Apple – the iPad filled a need people didn’t even know they had for something beyond an eBook, mobile device, tablet PC and smartbook.  No one seemed to notice that half the world doesn’t have perfect vision and watching/reading your content on an itty-bitty screen hasn’t been fun.  They know it now.  Source — IDC

Many expect mortals will grab up 50 million of the touchscreen tablet units by 2014.

As you would expect, Schmidt hustled the other Titans offering up his “open” OS solution.

Titans like HP, Dell, Asus, Acer, Lenovo, others set their minions to work to produce the impossible…a better iPad.

Everyone is waiting for the alternatives. Especially really “irritated” developers who spent a lot of time and effort developing all kinds of apps.

They expected to stay the course…use Flash conversion tools and sell in both the Windows and Apple environments.

Oh sure, the interactive Flash program sits on almost every computer and gives life to most of the video, animation and games on the Web.

But someone asked the Apple Titan how soon Flash would be on the iPhone and iPad the response was, “Uh, no.”

China Syndrome – With Google not on China’s “best friend” list, Apple’s iPad could see excellent sales there and around the globe.   All they have to do is solve a few “minor” supply chain problems like touchscreen production yields, keep the Apple ecosystem polished and beat off the alternatives.  Source — IDC

In addition to the rabid group of 1984 followers, Apple gained a new set of followers.

China probably has the same opinion Jobs as it does of Google.

Perseus, a Chinese convert, turned to Schmidt and said, “I’m not one of you! I’d rather die than stand alongside you!”

Jobs’ reassured them saying, “We’re making them as fast as we can. Our ramp is going well, but evidently we can’t quite make enough of them yet so we’re going to have to try harder,”

Jobs wasn’t through with Schmidt…not by a long shot.

His walled garden was becoming a sprawling self-contained ecosystem.

-        Computers, operating system, key apps

-        Music/content players, storefront

-        Smartphones, operating system, app rules/development kit, apps store

-        Tablet device, operating system, app rules/development kit, apps store

Some developers say Apple is worried mortals may venture out to other app stores.  Others say the closed environment will produce better apps, unique to the Apple environments (no more Adobe mistakes).

While the Titans stomped, hollered and kick fluffy clouds around, mere mortals just go out and buy what the early adopters/innovators say is hot, sexy, cool!!!

This week, its Apple.  A month from now it may be …

Zeus whispered to Jobs, “Embrace your birthright.”

Jobs looked around the walled garden and found it needed…its own ad platform.

Of course…iAd!!

Eyeballs Anyone? – With millions of iPhone and iPod users already in place and the prospects of even more iPad users enjoying themselves in the Apple walled garden in the near future, there was no better time for Jobs to unveil the company’s iAd program.  If it takes a little out of Google’s pockets…so much the better.

Telling a Pulitzer winner where to go?  Dumb!

Blowing off Flash?  Questionable.

Your own ad platform?  Priceless!

Gartner sees mobile advertising racking up about $1.6 billion this year and next year… iAd snaps revenue right out of Google’s pockets

Freedom to Move

Today, we’re moving toward 50 billion connections.

Aw, Come-on Titans – All of the Titans of the industry are developing end-to-end solutions for consumers to use, enjoy.  Works beautifully as long as you stay inside their ecosystem.  The problem is, people use a variety of devices, systems, applications from a variety of manufacturers.  Moving from one walled garden to another isn’t easy.  Source — IDC

The problem is, no one lives with one device.  You’re lucky if you can get by with two…or three.

We’ve using a wide range of mobile, fixed system/environments.

Applications and data are …everywhere.

Titans could care less how you quickly, easily, painlessly synchronize content from one device to another, one platform to another, one ecosystem to another.

They aren’t that benevolent!!!

Hades counseled the Titans, “I have watched from the underworld… it is time for the mortals to pay!”

Warm Down Here – While the Titans fight up there, consumers down here pay the price of having to endure the pain and anguish of using their content when they want, where they want, how they want.  Hardware, software, service, content providers all focus on the market – from their perspective – the rest is up to us.  Image – Warner Bros

We’re not taking sides with either Google or Apple in this little tiff.

Come-on Guys

All we want are things – hardware, software, services – that are adaptable and suitable for a specific task or set of tasks.

When Schmidt presents his neat ideas to mobile service providers, IT managers, content delivery services, governments, you name it; he really acts like he has us right there!!!!

Had ‘em Right Here – Google’s hold on everything Web has slipped a little recently.  New ecosystems – like Apple’s and Facebook’s – have become increasingly popular, drawing consumers – and advertisers – to newcorners of the universe.

Sure, Zeus, Perseus, Jobs have every right to strike back–and hard.  But man, it’s our stuff – content, data, communications, entertainment, information.

Saying, “hey, stay in the garden,” really isn’t a logical solution to the dilemma.

Before the next Super Bowl, we’d like to see Steve watch the 1984 ad again…very closely.

It’s almost getting to the point that Hades is right about both of them, “You have insulted forces beyond your comprehension.”

Andromeda was nice enough to reassure us, “This isn’t your fight!”

Ballmer is looking like a Titan we can live with!

He’s the only one not swingin at us…

by Andy AMrken

Maybe Chronos AkA Microsoft will rise to crush them all( LOL)

This sexy slider packs a very sold 1GHz snapdragon processor with a 4.1 display. Coming to Both At7T and T-mobile (yes)

Via Engadget

Ok we knew this was comine, and i hope hulu does add some features from what we here at booreatwork think HULU need in its subscription model. LA times is reporting HUlU is about to test its subscription service starting May 24th for $9.95. Also there will be a HUlU app ( hopefully streaming too)

Under the proposal, Hulu would continue to provide for free the five most recent episodes of shows like Fox’s “Glee,” “ABC’s “Lost” or NBC’s “Saturday Night Live.” But viewers who want to see additional episodes would pay $9.95 a month to access a more comprehensive selection, called Hulu Plus, these people said.

I believe Hulu should adopted the netflix tiered services

Booredatwork Suggestion

Pricing
Service Type

Free
unLimited online access,

Current show viewable at later dates.

No HD content (480p available)

Limited access with  mobile app ( ability to watch clips  small number of shows)

$9.99 starter
Unlimited online access

All content available in HD(1080p)

Current shows available an hour after airing

Customizable home landing page

Unlimited access with mobile app

Show reminders, (via email, or through mobile app)

$14.99 sports pack
Same features as starter pack

Ability to watch preselected sports programming live via Hulu service

Trial services period (1-3 months)
This should be a recurring program, allowing free subscribers the ability to sign up and enjoy the starter pack service for a period of time

Via LATimes

Coming to Verizon the Kin aims for the side kick crowd that Microsoft lost a bit to Motoblur. From the video and what we can see here. This truly is the Social media phone we have been hearing rumors about. Literally the phone is plastered with real-time social media updates view status and much more that takers connectivity to a new level

Via Gizmodo

Kin’s got three headline features: the Loop, the Spot and the Studio. If you’ve checked out Windows Phone 7 and its Live Tiles, the Loop will seem sorta familiar—it’s basically your favorite people and feeds, with their status updated in real time on your home screen. It’s the first thing you see when you turn the phone on, and unlike a standard Twitter timeline, it has a collage-y look to it.

Like Palm’s WebOS and Android 2.0, it integrates all of your contacts from Facebook and MySpace and Windows Live. There’s no Facebook or MySpace app, because everything is integrated. Your profile picture’s on the phone, for instance. The latest status updates from the friends you actually like show up in the Loop, but you can also deep dive into their profile, where you can see all of their info from Facebook or MySpace or whatever.

The Spot is one of Pink’s unique UI features—a dot, or spot, I suppose, permanently affixed the bottom center of the screen, you drag anything you want to share, from websites to photos to videos to status updates, down to the Spot, along with the people you wanna share it with, and it’s zapped over via the medium of your choice, like MMS or Facebook or email.

The Studio is the online portion of Kin, the site where all of your info is backed up, and you can view it like a timeline, with photos, messages, videos, call history and more arranged in grouped collages. Built on Silverlight, it’s oddly perhaps the most impressive part of Kin, creating the most seamless phone-to-PC-to-cloud experience ever. Everything—every photo, every video, every message—is backed up in full resolution, with geotagging to Studio. Every change, like adding contacts, you make in Studio is automatically synced to your phone. And it can do just about everything your phone can, like share via the Spot or check out the Loop. Simply put, Studio is the model for what an internet-connected phone experience should be like.

Kin One

A squircle-shaped slider that literally fits in the palm of your hand. It’s got the least impressive specs—a tinyish 320×240 screen, 5 megapixel camera, VGA video recording, 4GB of non-expandable storage, less RAM.

Kin Two

480×320 screen, 8 megapixel camera, 720p video recording, 8GB non-expandable storage. Both run on Nvidia’s Tegra

Video Demo

It’s no secret that here at Conversations we’re fans of the unlimited DRM-free music download offering that is Comes With Music. We’ve followed the musical marching band from its launch on handsets in 2008 to a succession of releases in Brazil, Russia, Indonesia and over 15 other countries. China is the latest in the lucky line-up to receive some Comes With Music action.

Read on to find out more about how Nokia has forged local partnerships, how you can get hold of it and full details on the local Chinese record labels that are now available via Comes With Music

Liz Schimel is Global Head of Music at Nokia and had this to say about today’s launch:

“Globally, we have expanded the reach of our music service to 30 markets in just 18 months. We are excited to see consumers building collections of the music they love through our service, and we are firmly on the path to delivering legal digital music to all parts of the world. It’s fantastic to have so many local and global labels partner with us to deliver this service in China. The industry came together to support us in innovating the mobile music business model in this unique market.”

Via Nokia Conversations

PRESS RELEASE

UNLIMITED MUSIC DOWNLOAD SERVICE REDEFINES CHINA’S MOBILE DIGITAL MUSIC LANDSCAPE
NOKIA’S GLOBAL MOBILE MUSIC LEADERSHIP UNDERLINED WITH LAUNCH OF DRM-FREE COMES WITH MUSIC SERVICE FOR MILLIONS OF CONSUMERS IN CHINA

Beijing, China & Espoo, Finland, April 8, 2010: Nokia today further increases its global footprint in the mobile music space with the launch of its ground breaking service, ‘Comes With Music’, in China. This announcement sees China’s number one mobile brand drive further innovation in the music space by introducing the first device and PC-based free, legal, DRM-free music download service in the world’s biggest mobile market.
The launch of Nokia’s unlimited music download offering in China adds further momentum to Nokia’s leadership in the world’s highest growth markets including Brazil, Russia and Indonesia. The forthcoming launch of the service in India will add significant scale and differentiation in another critical market.

In a local partnership with Huadong Feitian, the China launch further showcases Nokia’s expertise in delivering music services, tailored to local consumer needs. The service delivers a rich catalogue of local artists, unique features developed for the Chinese market, and a seamless, high quality music download experience.
Comes With Music will be available to consumers across China via a broad range of devices and through an extensive nationwide retail network. At launch, consumers can get unlimited music downloads with the purchase of any one of eight devices, to include the Nokia X6 32GB and Nokia X6 16GB, Nokia 5230, Nokia 5330, Nokia 5800w, Nokia 6700s, Nokia E52 and Nokia E72i. Entry level prices will start from EUR 140, excluding local taxes and subsidies.

“This launch delivers a truly mass market music offering from China’s most loved mobile brand. Our broad range of Comes With Music enabled devices and the high quality, DRM-free catalogue form the perfect legal download recipe for the world’s biggest market for mobile phones,” says Liz Schimel, Global Head of Music, Nokia. “Globally, we have expanded the reach of our music service to 30 markets in just 18 months. We are excited to see consumers building collections of the music they love through our service, and we are firmly on the path to delivering legal digital music to all parts of the world. It’s fantastic to have so many local and global labels partner with us to deliver this service in China. The industry came together to support us in innovating the mobile music business model in this unique market.”

The service will include catalogues from the major global labels Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music Group, EMI Music, and a host of local independent labels, including Huayi Brothers Media Group and Taihe Rye.
“China is a massive opportunity and a challenging market to address. Nokia is the undisputed dominant mobile player within China – there is no better partner with whom to develop the market in new, imaginative ways and make the most of its potential,” says Rob Wells, Senior Vice President, Digital, Universal Music Group International.
“We are delighted to be expanding our partnership with Nokia to bring Comes With Music to the Chinese market,” says Thomas Hesse, President, Global Digital Business, U.S. Sales and Corporate Strategy, Sony Music Entertainment. “We think there is great potential to convert China’s massive audience of music fans into consumers of legitimate digital music with compelling services that are easy-to-use and broadly available across a wide array of mobile devices.”

Song Ke, CEO, Taihe Rye, says; “We are very excited by the opportunity to have our music catalogue not only available in China, but to the rest of the world. Lovers of Chinese music can now download content from Comes With Music, broadening the market for our artists globally.”

“Establishing legitimate online music services in emerging markets is imperative for the music industry’s ongoing effort to remake itself,” says Mike McGuire, Research Vice President, Media IAS Team, Gartner. “By getting the Comes with Music service up and running in China, and with India coming on shortly, Nokia is taking important steps in continuing to expand its Comes With Music ecosystem. It’s also playing an important role in developing compelling alternatives for both artists and labels, and consumers.”

SAN DIEGO, CA – March 23, 2010 – In the first quarter of 2010, Slacker, Inc. launched its personal radio service in Canada, expanded mobile app access to the Palm WebOS and Android smartphones, launched Slacker 3.0 for BlackBerry smartphones and teamed up with Hello Music to provide unsigned artists with a new platform to play their music. From a new music perspective, Slacker debuted Artist Showcase stations with Radio AFI, programmed by the band themselves, teamed up with The Source for a new hip-hop station and created a fresh Indie station with FILTER Magazine in celebration of SXSW.

“By expanding internationally and onto new mobile platforms Slacker provides a broad range of listeners with an engaging and seamless listening experience, no matter where they go,” said Jonathan Sasse, senior vice president of marketing at Slacker. “The new FILTER, The Source and Radio AFI stations and our partnership with Hello Music highlight our commitment to bringing listeners all the music they love from sources they trust.”

Slacker Radio Available in Canada – Slacker Radio is the first personal radio experience to service Canada

Slacker Radio Mobile App for Palm webOS Smartphones – Slacker Radio on PalmPre, Palm Pre Plus, Palm Pixi, and Palm Pixi Plus

Slacker Radio 2.0 for Android Phones – Android users can wirelessly cache their favorite Slacker stations right to their phones to listen without a data connection

Slacker Radio 3.0 for BlackBerry Smartphones – new version with wireless station caching for personalized radio on-the-go without a data connection

Hello Music and Slacker Integration – Slacker and Hello Music partnered to offer unsigned bands a chance to upload their music and create their own dedicated radio stations on the service providing them with a new avenue to promote themselves and get their music into the hands of fans

Radio AFI Debuts on Slacker – Slacker launched the new Artist Showcase programming with Radio AFI, a diverse collection of music programmed by the band themselves

The Source Digital Radio – The Source Magazine teamed up with Slacker to create a free hip-hop station programmed by the industry gurus offering a range of Hip-Hop hits from classics to up-and-comers

Slacker and FILTER Magazine – A new customized Indie station, Austin 2010 Radio, with songs programmed by the team at FILTER Magazine launched at SXSW

Whether listening on the web, webOS smartphones, BlackBerry smartphones, iPhone and iPod touch, Android-powered smartphones, a Slacker-enabled TV or Blu-ray player, Slacker Personal Radio^* enables listeners to create their own Personal Radio stations based on any artist or mix of artists, or listen to and personalize over 120 expert-programmed genre stations ranging from Alternative Rock to Comedy and everything in between. Personalization options include rating songs or artists and listeners have instant access to artist profiles, album reviews and album cover art.

About Slacker, Inc.

Slacker is the world’s first Personal Radio company offering “Your Radio Everywhere.” Slacker enables music lovers to play highly personalized music online at the Slacker web site or on the go with Slacker Personal Radio players and mobile phones. Slacker mobile applications are currently available for Palm webOS, Android, iPhone and BlackBerry smartphones. For more information visit http://www.Slacker.com/everywhere.

For regular Slacker updates follow us at www.Twitter.com/SlackerRadio, become a Fan on Facebook at www.Facebook.com/SlackerRadio or visit www.Slacker.com.

Wow, hold on a sec, I thought Moto  and Google where tight.  first the Backflip loses Google on AT&T and now in China it is using Bing for all search functionality. What is going on here?

LIBERTYVILLE, Ill., March 10 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ – Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT) today announced a global alliance with Microsoft Corp. (NYSE: MSFT) to deploy Bing services on Motorola devices powered by Android.  This new offering, launching in China on smartphones in Q1, will provide consumers a choice when using search and map functions on their Android-based devices.

With this collaboration, consumers will enjoy a pre-loaded Bing bookmark on their mobile browser and an enhanced search widget with Bing integration.  By enabling users to customize their devices and select their own Search provider, Motorola, with help from Microsoft, is expanding the capabilities and range of services currently offered in the marketplace and opening the doors for increased personalization.

“We believe that consumer choice is one of the most critical components to ensuring a rich and seamless client experience,” said Christy Wyatt, corporate vice president of software and services, Motorola Mobile Devices. “Motorola and Microsoft have enjoyed a longstanding collaboration and the addition of Bing services to our Android-based smartphones in China is another important step in empowering our end-users.”

“Mobile devices continue to be a critical place for customers to access location-based services such as local search and mapping,” said Yusuf Mehdi, senior vice president of the Online Services Division at Microsoft. “We are pleased to expand our long-standing relationship with Motorola to bring powerful Bing location-based services to Motorola’s innovative new mobile devices, providing consumers with more choice and flexibility in mobile search.”

Search and Maps capabilities through Microsoft will initially be available in China, starting in Q1 2010, through either pre-load or over-the-air updates for devices already in market.

About Motorola

Motorola is known around the world for innovation in communications and is focused on advancing the way the world connects. From broadband communications infrastructure, enterprise mobility and public safety solutions to high-definition video and mobile devices, Motorola is leading the next wave of innovations that enable people, enterprises and governments to be more connected and more mobile. Motorola (NYSE: MOT) had sales of US $22 billion in 2009. For more information, please visit www.motorola.com.

MOTOROLA and the Stylized M Logo are registered in the US Patent & Trademark Office. Android is a trademark of Google, Inc. Microsoft is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. All other trademark and product or service names are the property of their respective owners.  © 2010 Motorola, Inc.  All rights reserved.

Via Newswire

Courtesy of Engadget

Motorola will be bringing out in Q3 an Android powered home phone. The phone will be powered with a DSP chipset and will support wifi, DECT 6.0, email, web browsing and full Android powered compliment on a home phone. The Motorola HS1001 cordless phone looks to change home phones, and hopefully it does. Maybe this is part of Google whole internet service provider plan, who knows but it seems Android wants to be everywhere

Press Release

Binatone, a Motorola Official Licensee, Selects DSP Group’s XpandR™ Chip Set

for its Touch-Screen Cordless Home Phone Powered by Android®

 

 

SAN JOSE, Calif., March 3rd, 2010 – DSP Group, Inc.™ (NASDAQ: DSPG), a leading global provider of wireless chipset solutions for converged communications at home and Binatone, a Motorola Official Licensee and a leading consumer electronics firm, announced today that Binatone has chosen DSP Group’s XpandR chipset for its multimedia cordless home phone powered by Android®. The Motorola phone will be available Q3 2010 in the US.

The Motorola HS1001 cordless phone offers Internet services such as e-mail and web browsing, via local Wi-Fi connectivity, and a touch screen interface with a virtual keyboard. DSP Group’s XpandR chip set, the world’s only system-on-a-chip (SoC) solution supporting both Wi-Fi and DECT 6.0, powers cordless communications and a full spectrum of multimedia applications for the home phone.

“Binatone has always been a company run with an entrepreneurial spirit and this latest Android launch, we believe is just the beginning of a larger trend towards more open consumer converged communications devices”, says Dino Lalvani, Chairman of Binatone. “Our partnership with DSP Group enables us to bring this innovative product quickly to market, while maintaining high standards of quality at an attractive price point.”

“We are proud to be the first company to bring Android capabilities into the home phone” said Oz Zimerman, VP of Marketing at DSP Group. “Our partnership with Binatone Motorola enables us to bring the XpandR chip set to the center stage of home telephony offering a fully integrated and connected multimedia device that brings a smart phone user experience to the home phone.”

About Binatone Electronics International Limited

Binatone was established in 1958 and is headquartered in Hong Kong. Binatone is a privately owned company engaged in the design, manufacturing and marketing of innovative consumer electronics products. The company markets products under the Binatone, iDECT and Voxtel brands in over 55 countries worldwide and is an OEM manufacturer for major telecommunications operators. Binatone is the global distributor for Motorola Digital Photo Frames, Baby and Video Monitors and the North American distributor for Motorola Cordless and Corded Telephones.

 

About DSP Group

DSP Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: DSPG) is a leading global provider of wireless chipset solutions for converged communications at home. Delivering system solutions that combine semiconductors and software with reference designs, DSP Group enables consumer electronics (CE) manufacturers to cost-effectively develop new revenue-generating applications with fast time to market. At the forefront of semiconductor innovation and operational excellence for over two decades, and with a dominant share of the wireless home telephony market, DSP Group provides a broad portfolio of wireless chipsets integrating DECT, Wi-Fi, PSTN and VoIP technologies with state-of-the-art application processors. Enabling converged voice, audio, video and data connectivity across diverse consumer products – from cordless and VoIP phones to home gateways and connected multimedia screens – DSP Group proactively partners with CE manufacturers to shape the future of converged communications at home. For more information, visit www.dspg.com.

 

All about money, money money.Why?

Via Nytimes

Unable to make the digital media dollars add up to their liking, Viacom will remove “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” “The Colbert Report” and other Comedy Central television shows from Hulu next week.

Although the companies said Tuesday evening that they were parting amicably, the decision represents the first major fracture between TV show owners and the wildly popular video Web site.

Viacom’s decision is a serious loss for Hulu — this week “The Daily Show” is listed as the third most-watched TV show on the site — and it is a reminder that content owners can control just how much video — or how little — is placed online for all to view. At the moment, that spigot is being tightened, in part to protect the industry’s primary revenue stream, cable and satellite distribution.

However, the severing of ties with Hulu does not represent a strategic shift for Viacom. Comedy Central will continue to stream full episodes of the shows on TheDailyShow.com and ColbertNation.com, respectively.

Viacom’s Comedy Central channel reached a programming agreement with Hulu in mid-2008 that placed “The Daily Show,” “The Colbert Report” and a sampling of other shows on the service.

“In the past 21 months, we’ve had very strong results for both Hulu and Comedy Central, in terms of the views and revenue we’ve generated,” said Andy Forssell, senior vice president of content and distribution for Hulu, in a blog post Tuesday evening.

Mr. Forssell said that Hulu’s viewers had been “extremely vocal and passionate” about “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report.”

In a message that seemed written specifically for Comedy Central, he said that Hulu had “driven steadily increasing revenue per view” for the shows “as advertisers voted with their budgets to take advantage of innovative ad formats and very strong advertising effectiveness.”

Statement by Comedy Central:

Comedy Central has made “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” and “The Colbert Report” available to consumers through Hulu since June 2008. Although that agreement has concluded, full-length episodes of each show will remain available at TheDailyShow.com and ColbertNation.com, respectively.

Hulu was one of the many digital distribution partners we’ve worked with over the past few years to add new outlets for our valuable and powerful content and to help drive the businesses of our partners. We had a great experience with Hulu, and we hope to work with its team again in the future.

More http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/02/viacom-will-take-daily-show-colbert-off-hulu/

This is an interesting article about the smartphone market in 2010 by Tomi T Ahonen. Enjoy

The big battle this year in mobile will be in smartphones. Not because of reasons many pundits and analysts now suggest, that somehow this is that everybody caught the iPhone fever or that Google somehow energized the field with its Nexus phone. No, those are overhyped views with an overly US-centric view. Remember that differing from most high tech and media industries like computers, TVs, air travel, advertising, military spending, music, movies, rocket science etc, where the US tends to reflect about half of global spending of the given industry. That is not so in mobile telecoms. US cellphone users (about 285 million subscriptions) represent only 7% of the global subscriber base of 4.6 Billion. While Americans are now getting heavily into smartphones, Forrester just today reported that the total installed base of smartphones in the USA is only 17%. The EU projects that for the EU region, smartphones will be half of all phones this year.
While the American pundits, journalists and analysts obsess about the iPhone, Palm, Google etc devices, that is not the main battle. Its a side-show in the big global fight for smartphones. And while some North American players are indeed quite strong – RIM is the world’s second largest smartphone maker behind Nokia – this battle is now heating up considerably for 2010. Some very powerful players are bringing in their A-game. And both market leaders, Nokia and RIM have refocsed very hard for this upcoming battle to be able to respond to the challenges. Most other smartphone makers have not caught on. The battle will be brutal this year. It will not be pretty.

NOKIA
The reports of Nokia’s demise were premature. Even Nokia’s own analysis got it wrong for the third quarter of 2009 when they reported a serious decline in their market share. After all numbers came out, turned out that Nokia had had only very minor 1% fluctuation in its smartphone market share, and as is usual, Nokia’s smartphone market share remained well above its global handset market share, itself the best in the world.
Last year analysts were not impressed with the N97 and then there was confusion about Symbian vs Maemo and what of Nokia’s Ovi store for apps and various smartphone content and services. So where do we stand? Nokia’s market share in smartphones is as big as number 2 and number 3 combined, and more importantly, Nokia’s smartphone market share is better than its overall handset market share. And they are doing this with a mobile phone manufacturing juggernaut which has been profitable every single quarter of the decade, while each of their big 5 rivals has struggled and posted numerous unprofitable quarters along the way (the last quarter Nokia posted a loss, but not with its handset unit, the loss was due to its infrastructure unit NokiaSiemens Networks). Typically at least 2 of the rivals are unprofitable and in some quarters all four have been so.

Do not put any credibility to any “Admob” stats or pay too much attention to Nokia ‘failing’ in the US domestic market for smartphones. If the choice is to be the desired smartphone brand in the 93% of the world’s phone market that is not the USA, or the 7% that is the USA, Nokia has certainly made the right call to its strategy.
But it won’t be easy going. A couple of years ago, the Symbian operating system was owned across several giant handset makers (Nokia part owned with SonyEricsson, Samsung, Motorola etc) and had over 60% market share. Now being only Nokia’s owned operating system, its installed base is about 50% of the world’s smartphones and currently sell a little over 40% of the world’s smartphones. Note that most of that decline was various non-Nokia phones shifting away from Symbian. Nokia’s own Symbian sales level is very stable. But it is not growing, it is in slight decline. So don’t mistake Motorola and SonyEricsson and Samsung (and others) shifting away from Symbian as somehow a ‘Nokia decline’ in Symbian. Nokia Symbian is still very healthy at or about 40% on an annual sales level.

What is Nokia doing? While it introduced Maemo to power high end smartphones, Nokia is aggressively pushing the Symbian system down to mid-price phones where ‘feature phones’ used to be. It is expanding its proportion of touch screen devices (to position more against the iPhone) and more importantly, expanding its proportion of QWERTY phones against the Blackberry. Some very promising news came out of the UK this past December, that Nokia is back as the top preferred phone brand among UK youth in the Mobile Youth survey of phone brand preferences.
Most of all, any analysts should keep in mind, that thephone market is not an open ‘free market’. There are severe distortions by the enterprise/business segment, and the carrier/operator subsidy model in many countries. I explained these in my blog about smartphone market share secrets last year.

The key point to take away, is that Apple says openly that its best markets are in those countries with strong operator/carrier subsidies. They do not do as well in markets where customers pay full price for the phone (the real price of an iPhone 3G on AT&T is not 100 dollars, even Americans pay the real price of about 600 dollars for their iPhones, but the remaning nearly 500 dollars is hidden payments in the 2 year payment plan). Meanwhile, in every single market that is open, ie carriers do not subsidise most phones and the phone makers get to sell their own phones directly – and which are not controlled by a domestic maker or makers (like in South Korea for example) – Nokia is the run-away market leader in all phones, and in smartphones. For any analyst who suggests Nokia is ‘losing’ the game against the iPhone, that should give some pause. In all markets where there are no subsidies to distort the picture, Nokia wins hands-down… And Apple itself admits it struggles in precisely those markets. Who makes the “most desirable” phones when we take price into the equation? Not necessarily the single best phone for internet surfing, but rather a series of phones to suit mass market tastes? Thats Nokia, hands down. As big as number 2 and number 3 combined.

Even with all that, expect Nokia not to grow market share this year in smartphones, and very likely to lose some in 2010. The competition is coming from every angle and the big leaders will likely feel the heat. Nokia has been aggressively moving downstream in price and gets some solace that its price points are difficult for smaller brands to match, but its going to be a very rough year. And whether any newcomer focuses against the iPhone or the Blackberry, they will automatically also then target some part of Nokia.
RIM
The amazing untold success story, far bigger story than Apple, is RIM. Blackberries were nerdy US centric business phones only a few years ago. Europeans and Asians would not take to the flat, wide, weird Canadian phones. Try as they might, even as American conglomerates took to Blackberries by storm, and started to call it the Crackberry – 75% of American business/enterprise smartphones are Blackberries (says Ostermann survey in 2009)

The rest of the world did not fall in love with Blackberries. But RIM plugged along and slowly got traction in many markets in the enterprise/corporate space. They did particularly well in Latin America. But then came the SMS texting craze even to American shores, and whether by design or by accident, the youth of the world discovered the Blackberry. Not your boss’s phone, but your kid’s phone. And success followed. About at the same time, again perhaps by design, perhaps by accident, RIM expanded its product line of Blackberries to more models and several of these were more suited to consumers. RIM added cameras to these, and what businesses previously were reluctant to accept – cameraphones – started to infiltrate the business phone space. But now the Blackberries were very well suited for consumer use.

First the overall numbers. Today one in five smartphones sold – actually already 21% by the third quarter of 2009 – was a Blackberry. Remember that only 17% of smartphones are Apple iPhones. Why all that hype about the Apple and total silence about the Blackberry? Partly because this success is on strange foreign shores. In Venezuela the bestselling phone brand – not smartphone brand – is the Blackberry. In Indonesia the youth most popular phone is now the Blackberry. In the UK survey of university students, UK is traditional SonyEricsson and Nokia ‘back yard’ – Blackberry is now the third most popular phone brand, not the iPhone.

On RIM, this is the only brand I can promise you, it will grow market share in 2010. Why? Because first of all, it has a ‘lock’ on the enterprise/corporate market. The business phone market will not shift simply because there is one hot new smartphone this quarter, like a Palm Pre or Motorola Droid or iPhone 3GS or Google Nexus One or Nokia E72. The business phone market is incredibly stable because business customer IT departments resist any change and any new systems to be added and to be supported. In the big US market, Blackberry can very safely rely on something nearly 75% of all business smartphone sold this year. It may fluctuate a little up or down, but it is incredibly stable.
At the same time, the Blackberry keeps making more inroads to business phone use in all other markets, due to its incredibly well optimized business oriented form factors, solutions and apps and services. The Blackberry is simply the best enteprise phone solution on the planet. Now they have President Obama as the ultimate unofficial spokesman, the Blackberry President. They have achieved such certifications as NATO level quality of security on their device so for any business users, this is really a secure and safe platform. Their non-US global business-oriented smartphone user base will grow disproportionately well, rivalled only by Nokia with its E-Series. This market share segment will be particularly secure from any inroads by any new operating systems like the Apple iPhone or Google Android or Samsung Bada. Not because the phone is bad, but simply because IT departments will fight tooth and nail against any new OS. A survey by TBI Research in 2009 found that 80% of US businesses refuse to have more than one operating system for smartphones – and in most cases that is now the Blackberry. This is an incredibly stable source of revenue and unit sales and subscriptions for RIM.
But its huge growth is that successful transition from business phone to residential phone. And while all the press, analysts, pundits and ‘experts’ obsess about touch screen smartphones, the truth is that far more QWERTY phones are sold worldwide than touch screen phones. The internet use is not addictive, but SMS text messaging is addictive as proven in university studies like the one at Queensland University of Australia. So while both inputs are of course desirable and have their proponents, the fact is, that QWERTY trumps touch screen. Why is Nokia now rolling QWERTY keypads to its cheapest non-smartphones? Nokia know this, they invented the QWERTY keyboard in the world’s first smartphone, the Communicator 9000, and they were the world’s first entity to suggest SMS might be addictive, a decade ago. Nokia know this.

But RIM have optimized their phones for mobile messaging. It is a perfect starting point. Then they have the Blackberry instant messenger, which appeals to the youth in particular as it offers free messages between Blackberry users. That in turn brings in a contagion effect, you want to have the Blackberry specifically, because your friends use it. And then there is the cool factor, suddenly the Blackberry is the phone all older teenagers and young adults want to have. RIM is right now in a sweet spot, all things going for them. It is no surprise, that in the shadow of the world’s most spectacular high tech launch ever, the iPhone – RIM has consistently outsold the iPhone and grown its own market share.

I can tell you that often analysts and pundits even in the various early adopter markets like say Indonesia, where Blackberries emerged as the youth ‘must-have’ phone, inspite of their considerable cost differential above typical youth phones; the early experts were dumbfounded and could not explain it. I have heard various RIM experts say the same, that they are not sure exactly how and why, but are trying to learn this as much as possible and then capitalize on this knowhow.
I think it speaks volumes that Nokia is copying RIM not only with E-Series form factors, but now with cheaper non-smartphones adopting QWERTY keypads. Both RIM and Nokia know that the biggest single segment of the smartphone battlefield will not be touch screens, it will be QWERTY phones. And I would hope that at times the operators/carriers would be reminded of this too – that AT&T and O2 and other networks complain about congestion with the iPhone, but QWERTY Blackberries and Nokias do messaging, very profitable services for the operators… So its in the core profitability interests of the operators/carriers to promote QWERTY phones, not touch screen phones.
Anyway, all signs suggest that Blackberries are achieving ‘must have’ status among the youth. Youth fashions and desires can be fickle so this is by no means a guarantee of long term success, but for this year 2010 this bodes very well for Blackberry. As they are very secure to hold onto business/enterprise customers and see growth in youth markets, they are sure to pick up some market share points even in this very competitive year of 2010.

APPLE
Apple is also growing strong currently. They have been expanding their global footprint but it is a worrysome detail, that out of all iPhones ever sold, 43% have been activated by AT&T (Said AT&T late last year). The iPhone is the darling of Americans but doesn’t seem to engender the same level of passion across the oceans. Yet 17% of all smartphones sold in the third quarter last year were iPhones. That is very good news for Apple and they keep growing year on year. Remember that as Apple only introduce one new model per year in June, they have that peculiar sales pattern where their sales grow in the second half of the year, but then always decline stronly in the first quarter of the new year. So don’t be alarmed, but be prepared, that when the January-March quarter sales numbers come out in about April of 2010, there will be inevitably a decline in Apple market share. That is not a sign of trouble, it is only because the 3GS will be 9 months old by then – near-obsolete in smartphone terms – and the next iPhone is not due until June of 2010.
But its not going to be an easy year for Apple. The early strongly operator/carrier subsidised markets are all now ‘done’ and have the iPhone. As Apple tries to bring its ultra-expensive superphone to ever less affluent markets, it finds it hard to sell meaningful numbers. China is a perfect example, Apple was really struggling to get its iPhone to move in any relevant numbers in China. And its strategy of going with an exclusive carrier/network in major markets is backfiring (as I predicted) and they are now expanding networks in many markets. There is continuing speculation that the exclusive deal with AT&T will end as well.

Most of all, Apple faces severe competition in the consumer space. The 3GS was a good phone last summer but now is really showing its age already. 3 megapixels is very modest for a 600 dollar smartphone where other brands do 8 megapixels and in advanced markets like Japan and South Korea 12 megapixels is now the standard for premium phones. A flash? When can we see that? And no removable battery, no memory slot, no QWERTY keyboard, etc. Apple is seeing a lot of business going to near rivals who also offer 3 inch touch screens but in many ways ‘better’ features. And please Apple fans don’t write about that. Yes, the Apple is by far the most user-friendly phone. But that goes only so far. And at some point Apple has to release more than one phone model per year else its market share growth will stagnate. I believe this year 2010 will drive that lesson home to Apple HQ loud and clear.

Anyway, Apple needs yet another hit this June. If they manage once again to do a magical phone that everybody loves, they’ll be fine to the end of the year. But in 2007 when there were very few phones of a similar form factor, Apple had this 3 inch touch screen market segment to itself. Today every major maker offers 3 inch touch screens, and the competition is proving rough for Apple.
What is certain, is that for the start of the year 2010, Apple’s market share will sink of course, due to an aging model line. Will it recover for the second half of 2010, will depend on how amazing the next iPhone will be (it will definitely be better of course). But now most new rivals are all targeting this Apple area – not the enterprise space where RIM is, and not the low price angle where Nokia is. The new competition will almost all hit Apple square center. Like the Google Nexus One right now.
I would say for the year, if Apple can hold onto its market share – remember the smartphone market itself will explode this year -so there is going to be a lot of organic growth for those who can hold onto market share, so that is still good news. I don’t see much chance for strong growth, but it does depend on that one new iPhone model next June. It could be a ‘must have’ phone perhaps. I’d say the single best tool for Apple would be a QWERTY keyboard but I’ve been saying that since 2007 and of course Apple don’t listen to me haha…

HTC
The fourth largest smartphone maker is not SonyEricsson or Motorola, it is Taiwanese HTC. They manufacture for example the Google Nexus One. But even before there was an Android operating system from Google, HTC was the fourth largest smartphone maker with about 5% of the market. HTC has often struggled with the lackluster performance of Windows Mobile – HTC was the launch smartphone for WinMo early int the decade (after MS suddenly pulled the rug out from under their first-annnounced WinMo launch handset maker, UK based Sendo, if you remember) – and HTC has been WinMo’s standard-bearer ever since. HTC CEO said in 2009 that 80% of all WinMo phones ever made, were manufactured by HTC. So now that HTC is shifting most of their smartphones away from the Microsoft operating system to Google’s Android, is coming as a very hard hit to Microsoft.

So HTC was already plugging happily along in the fourth place, and now they have been increasing the awareness of their own brand, and then they have the sudden added support of the Google brand. This is sure to bring growth to HTC. How far can they grow? They are perceived as a small ‘built-to-order’ maker, and don’t have the brand appeal of the Samsungs and SonyEricssons in the eyes of the big mobile operators./carriers or the independent handset resellers in open markets. But they are now on a good growth path. I think they’re a pretty sure bet to increase market share in 2010.
FUJITSU
So the fifth biggest smartphone maker is Fujitsu out of Japan. What? You never heard of Fujitsu’s smartphones? Thats because they mostly focused on the home Japanese market the past few years. In Japan the major smartphone platforms are Symbian and Linux, but most smartphones are ‘crippled’ by the operators/carriers with standard features and often the user cannot install apps like they could on a similar device in most other markets. Still, as a smartphone maker, Fujitsu is experienced and big. Plus they are one of the biggest makers of laptop computers so they have that synergy in distribution chain, brand and tech support.
What can we expect out of Fujitsu. Last year they said that they are going to refocus on the world market. Expect Fujitsu branded smartphones to appear in selected markets during the year. They are a luxury brand sitting right next door to China, it would sound like a good strategy to push into China. Japan often looks at Taiwan as their back yard, so its another obvious early target market. Beyond that, it will probably be random markets this year as they sample world tastes and see which markets would be receptive to the Fujitsu brand of phones once again.
Fujitsu have the advantage of learning about end-user preferences in the single most advanced mobile phone market, Japan. So they can bring ideas and innovations and technologies that have an advantage. I would expect that Fujitsu will be targeting initially the top end of the smartphone market, nearer to netbooks and web tablets, and going of course head-to-head with the Apple iPhone line. But if they can hold steadily onto about a 4% global market share in smartphones simply by selling in Japan, and now start to expand, expect them to grow organically at least a few percentage points globally.

SAMSUNG
Samsung had been giving smartphones lip service for many years. They had smartphones on just about every platform, on Symbian, on Windows Mobile, on Android etc. Now they have decided that it is a battle they want to enter and to win in it. And they have made that strategic commitment of releasing their own smartphone operating system, Bada. Samsung had previously held something like 3% market share in smartphones, but – in feature phones with touch screens – they already outsell the iPhone. All Samsung need to do, is to switch their touch screen phones from their proprietary operating system to Bada during 2010, and they will exceed the iPhone annual sales in smartphones…
If executed perfectly, Samsung would seem to appear out of nowhere and in one year leapfrog Microsoft Windows Mobile, Google Android and Apple iPhone. Don’t be surprised to see this happening. The South Koreans are nothing if not competitive, and they work day and night and weekends to achieve their objectives. And Samsung says in every market they intend to be one of the top 3, or its not worth competing. They have the scale to do it, and I am very confident within at least 18 months they will overhaul those three, lagging only behind RIM and Nokia. Whether it happens in 2010 remains to be seen how far Samsung is along its diabolical world domination plans. But they will certainly grow every quarter this year once the Bada phones are launched. Grow every quarter, mark my words.
I expect that during 2010 Samsung will push its Bada operating system aggressively to its mid range feature phones, and by converting these to ‘smartphones’ – they will achieve the most amazing market share growth ever seen in the smartphone space. Yes, in some ways its a bit of ‘cheating’ with accounting, but it fits the smartphone definition and Samsung will be grabbing headlines. As these will predominantly be touch screen phones, it will be seen as being head-on battle against the iPhone, even though in price it will more appropriately be a battle against market leader Nokia.

SONY ERICSSON
A bit player in the smartphones space, SonyEricsson was one of the first major smartphones and has had very high end prestige and popular business and residential phones in that area, but only a tiny part of their total lineup. Since Sony released the Walkman and Cybershot brands to the SonyEricsson partnership, the SE phones have been in the mid-range of excellent dedicated musicphones and cameraphones. But the advent of the iPhone decimated SE’s musicphone market and the brand has been struggling severely to find a place recently. SE has been losing global handset market share and its smartphones have suffered in that same process. Even that news out of UK university students preferring SonyEricsson as the second most popular phone brand is actually bad news for SE, as previously SE was tops. They are moving down in preference among even the youth. All news is bad news at SE.
Recently with the Symbian OS shifting to Nokia ownership, SE has little reason to particularly push Symbian in its smartphones and is shifting to Android. But the total shipments are low in numbers and the total brand is in confusion. I don’t see SE particularly growing. They have to stabilize their overall handset market share first, and then worry about smartphones. This could be a good year for SE to ignore the wars in the smartphone bloodbath and find attractive niche markets elsewhere and stabilize their profitability. I’ve been saying dfor years now, that what SE needs is the Playstation phone, which could be a hit product. Remember that most of the paid apps on the iPhone are games. But yes, if the PSP phone appears, SE could have a sudden surge. Else – and more likely not – I don’t see them as growing. They will be in the ‘other’ category of smartphones and mostly ignored.

MOTO
Poor Motorola. They are so on the ropes. I wrote my open letter to them, that they should do SMS texting optimized phones to save the company (something RIM ended up doing and growing magnificently). But Moto have staked the whole company on one Android phone, the Motorola Droid, and now ‘Do no evil’ Google has stabbed them openly in the back with the Nexus One. Motorola is doing its best, but their global handset market share has been in total freefall for years – they have gone from 22% to 5% in three years! – and they now are feeling the breath of RIM in their neck, a pure smartphone maker who may overtake Motorola in total phones shipped some quarter this year.
It was a risky move to make a heavy move into smartphones. The Droid is not going to make meaningful inroads into the enterprise space for the same reasons that RIM owns that space and others can’t get in. So the Droid has to fight it out in the high end of the smartphones, against the iPhone and high end smartphones from Nokia to Google to HTC to Fujitsu to Samsung to Palm to just about anyone.. But it was a popular move to US based investors, so Moto made its bed and now must sleep in it.
I don’t see Moto having much chance outside the US market in this heated contest, to peddle its smartphone to consumers who had grown very tired of the Moto brand the last few years. Not in this year with so many exciting new smartphones appearing in the same price bracket. And the US market is not big enough to give Moto the gains it needs. I see Moto overall losing handset market share and being irrelevant in the numbers of the smartphone battle. Incidentially, ZTE out of China as a non-smartphone basic phones maker is about to pass Moto as the fifth biggest phone maker, so the fall from grace continues in any case, Moto is headed to the waste basket of the industry.
Motorola may appear on the charts for US smartphones with some market share, but nowhere near market leader RIM or second place iPhone. Too little too late. When will Moto close shop? At Forum Oxford we have already a Motorola death-watch… They are certainly already on the ropes

PALM
Palm sells only about 800,000 smartphones so apart from being a curiosity in the US market, they are irrelevant in the big picture. They don’t account for one percent of the market and have essentially no chance of growing market share in this bloodbath of a year in smartphones. I would not be surprised if Palm passes onto history during this year.
LG
A more interesting player in smartphones is LG. LG is the third biggest handset maker out of South Korea and like Samsung, they have pretty much ignored the smartphone space. But – remember the original ‘amazing’ looks of the iPhone? That totally radical one button touch screen flat 3.5 inch screen wonderphone when first shown by Steve Jobs in January 2007?
The looks of the iPhone, exact dimensions, etc, were considered in January 2007 to be a copy of an industrial design winning LG phone – from 2006. Apple designers cleverly copied an award-winning LG design to create the ‘wow’ factor in 2007, because LG had not brought this phone to the Western markets (we eventually saw the consumer version of it as the LG Chocolate, released in Europe before the iPhone launched in the USA in 2007). So LG knows fully well how to do this type of phones and form factors. They just haven’t bothered to do that as a “smartphone” so far. But the LG Chocolate was Europe’s bestselling phone at one point in 2007 and in its lifetime has sold more units than all iPhones.
If LG feels like they’d want to have a major market share in smartphones, they could do the same as Samsung, introduce a smartphone OS to the next edition of the Chocolate and having a far cheaper phone of the popular touch screen and 3 inch screen form factor, they could easily outsell the iPhone ‘as a smartphone’ within about a year – to 18 months. But that ‘step’ is not even taken yet, as Samsung did announce its Bada operating system and will clearly now fight for the smartphone space, LG has not made any such bold announcements. At the CES this week LG has introduced two smartphones and they made noises that they’d like to get more market success in smartphones. If they so desire, they can become a massive global rival in no time. Remember in scale as a handset maker they already are far bigger than any North American phone makers including Palm, Apple, RIM and Motorola.

OTHER JAPANESE
There are actually seven handset makers out of Japan and several have expressed interest last year in moving abroad, or ‘returning’ to the overseas phone markets that the Japanese brands (other than Sony/SonyEricsson) abandoned a decade ago. Some of the brands will not be doing it as smartphones but some may. We have powerhouse electronics brands there like Panasonic, NEC and Sharp. And the biggest of the Japanese handset makers is Kyocera. Any of them may find it suddenly appealing to capture part of the limelite in smartphones and do a nice little splash some time in 2010. But I don’t see them taking big market shares in smartphones but keep an eye out for the GSM World Congress in Barcelona in February for any surprise announcements.

DELL
Doesn’t it seem like every PC maker is suddenly doing smartphones? Dell is also in the game now. They will be releasing their first smartphone in America on the AT&T network. Dell will struggle severely for early years in their entry, in building carrier relationships with the 160 or so significant mobile operator/carriers and the 600 overall; as well as hundreds of national resellers in so many markets. They will find that the smarpthones market is totally different from the PC market and that normal free market rules do not apply. And that to get scale, they have to move downstream and diversify fast – like Blackberry has done. I don’t see them being a global powerhouse yet and won’t register in the one percent market share range this year, but they are yet another brand doing high end internet-oriented smartphones (against the iPhone).

GOOGLE
Google’s entry into the smartphone space is seen by some as going back on their word (that they do not intend to be a phone maker), and by others as stepping severely on the toes of their Android handset maker partners. The Google Nexus One suggests there will be a Two and more, so it seems like Google has made a strong commitment to become a handset maker brand, whether their phone is physically made by HTC or not.
Initially the Nexus One is energizing the US focused tech media and analysts into a frenzy but I would think this will subside. It is a phone positioning at the iPhone end of the consumer market, as a pure touch-screen device and labeled a ‘superphone’ in the US market, it is already attracting direct comparisons to the iPhone. Price wise its conveniently 10% cheaper. But Google has the advantage of not limiting the Nexus to one carrier only. And quite alarmingly for the iPhone US market aspirations, the Nexus will be both in a GSM and CDMA version (T-Mobile first, but Verizon version to follow). Google also has the Vodafone networks as reseller partners so it will make quite a splash globally as well.
Because it goes against so many other similar Android devices and tries to fight against the iPhone head-on, I don’t see them replicating Apple’s first year success of 10 million units, so the Nexus will be very low in the single digits even if all goes well. But behind the scenes, many Android device makers cannot be happy and there is probably a lot of lobbying to stop Google from this path. They may find a device maker revolt and be forced to pull out. On the other hand, most of the Android partners have poor options right now – Windows Mobile 6.5 is not much of an option and going back to Symbian means supporting rival Nokia – Google may well be seen as the lesser of all evils (as opposed to ‘do no evil’)

MICROSOFT
Microsoft once had 30% of the smartphone market share. Yes thats true. Today they are vanishing fast. They have seen many Windows Mobile handset makers shift to Android and Samsung launch their own OS, so expect WinMo to keep losing market share. The worst news, one could say devastating news was that HTC decided to focus on Android for this year, as they won’t do WinMo 6.5 devices and await WinMo 7. Microsoft has promised WinMo 7 will be released at the end of this year but so often in the past Microsoft’s launch dates have slipped and the WinMo handset community and developer community have no reassurances that Microsoft has woken up to mobile and is taking it any more seriously now as it has in the many years of the past. (My open letter to them has been read widely at Microsoft HQ but they still don’t get it).
Microsoft has to expend a lot of resources to support WinMo 6.5 and develop 7, all while their market share seems to be cut in half quarter after quarter after quarter. One wonders why they bother, and there is a deathwatch for WinMo also at Forum Oxford already. There is no light in this tunnel and one wonders at what point MS simply decides to throw in the towel and not bother to fight for this dwindling opporunity, especially as the fight heats up so much this year with so many fresh new players and far more modern operating systems.

WHAT OF APPS STORES?
Haha, Apps stores are a total non-story. They do not matter one iota in the big battle for smartphones this year, but you will hear all kinds of silly stats and forecasts and billions of downloads. That will not determin the market success. I told you what decides market success globally in smartphones. I also told you the media’s silly obsession with app stores is pointless. But I furthermore said that app stores are a good trend, and eventually, in many years from now, we may have real value out of app stores. Whenever you hear ‘app store’ mentioned in 2010 safely skip the story, it is meaningless to smartphone market success. Don’t fall for the app store hype.

What will it look like after 2010 is done? I see Nokia in the 35 to 40 percent market share range. RIM will grow to the 22 – 25 percent market share. Apple may hold onto about 15-18 percent share depending on how ‘awesome’ the next June 2010 version of their iPhone is. Samsung is likely to grow at least past the others with Bada to fourth place and will certainly eventually overtake the iPhone, but that I see happening more in an 18 month scale than this year. Still they will be a solid number 4. I’d put them around 10% give or take a few points.

HTC will be the biggest of the smaller players due in large part to Google’s Nexus and its brand. It will help sell any HTCs. I would say HTC grows but to something like 6% or 7%. At worst they hold fifth place at about 5%. Toshiba is going to push abroad, expect them to battle HTC. LG is a dark horse, depending on if they go full steam suddenly into smartphones or are happy to do touch screen feature phones.
The other brands will be in the roughly 1 percent or less range including Motorola. SonyEricsson, Palm, some other Japanese makers, Google’s own brand (double-counted in HTC above), and Dell. Should SonyEricsson do a PSP phone (most likely then as a smarpthone) that would give SE a big boost. And I’m pretty sure we’ll see more PC makers rushing to a smartphone near you, like Lenovo, Acer, HP, Toshiba etc.
It will be a bloodbath in 2010 and we will be keeping score in the media often. The only thing I urge you to keep in mind – the US market is totally not symptomatic of the rest of the world. Only one in 12 phones sold in the world is in America, so don’t think the biggest battlefield will be on those shores. No, the big battles at the high end of the price range will be in Western Europe and the low end of the smartphone battle will be in Asia. Those are the markets where this war will be won or lost. But it will be an interesting year in mobile.

Addendum – someone commented asking me to explicitly mention my background, that I have been employed by Nokia in the past and that Nokia is still a customer of mine. That is true, and I say so countless times in my books and on this blog and when I speak in public; but perhaps it again needs to be repeated? I left Nokia HQ in 2001 and my last post with them was the Global Head of Business Consulting. Perhaps I should also state that earlier in my career I was employed by a company that was an Authorized Apple Reseller as one of their Apple/Mac trainers, so I probably also have a strong positive Apple bias. Since 2001 I have been an independent consultant. I do not disclose any customers of my consulting who do not first openly acknowledge their relationship with me. Nokia has been kind enough to do so, so yes, Nokia is one of my reference customers. Out of this list of handset makers, so too my reference customers include RIM, Motorola, SonyEricsson and LG. There are others on this list who have not yet disclosed in public that they have used me. Note that in this blog I am positive of some of ‘my customers’ (RIM and LG) and negative of others (SonyEricsson and Motorola) and am both positive and negative of Nokia. I am known for speaking the truth as I see it, even when this means that I am critical companies that have given me consulting work. The amazing thing is, they do respect that, and keep giving me more work. But yes, if you need to hear it, yes I am a Finn, I was employed by Nokia up to 2001 and they are still giving me consulting work, as do four other companies in this list.
PS – two items may be of further interest to visitors. A video of my presentation of the mobile industry – nicely showing my slides as well, side-by-side, entitled the next four billion (mobile phone subscriptions to the planet that has only 6.7 billion people and over 4 billion mobile phones) has been viewed over 3,000 times already and many seem to quite like it. Its at this link Tomi Ahonen keynote presentation from Picnic conference Amsterdam.

And for those who would like to read about some astonishing numbers of the mobile phone industry – more cameraphones than digital cameras, more alarm clocks used on phone than stand-alone alarm clocks etc, read my essay on The Nokia Decade.

Via BusinessInsider

Vodafone CEO Vittorio Colao lashed out at Google in Barcelona, claiming the search giant’s online dominance will (somehow) screw up the mobile market.

Vittorio presented a slide showing Google owning 80% of the online advertising market and said that dominance is something that needs to be looked at,Dow Jones reports:

“With regards to Google, we need to be able to freely deal up and down the value chain. The fact that 80% of the advertising online goes down one funnel is something that should be looked at in the future debate on net neutrality,” he said, adding that the European Commission and FCC should ensure rules are put in place “to enable competition at all levels.”

Total at MWC 2010 Microsoft that declared war on the mobile market by announce and showing off windows 7 phones series. Which is all honesty is the Zune phone, and that good in my opinion. MS needed a fresh start and it looks like the have it here. No detailed hardware specs have been announced. we know Microsoft is not building hardware but are laying done specific hardware guidelines, to ensure uniformity of all windows 7 phones. Also there will be no 3rd part skins over the UI (sorry HTC & Samsung). from the sound of thing. MS is very serious.Here are some pics of the new device.

There is xbox live intergration, the interface is very Zune like and looks smooth .Also outlook looks to be of next generation status. Though on a sad note, all legacy Windows mobile apps are not compatible with Windows 7 series. So Microsoft has come out to answer critics who said innovation is dead at the company and heed warning to its competitors Apple and Google. It going to be a three way race. I want one now.

Via Engadget

he X10 twins run Android 1.6 (though with the time to market gap we’ve come to expect from SE this could change) on a 600MHz Qualcomm MSM7227 and will ship in both North American and global 3G variants with quad-band EDGE, WiFi, Bluetooth, and a pack-in 2GB microSD card. As far as OS tweaks are concerned, Sony Ericsson’s Timescape is being touted as a major feature that enables all your communications with contacts to be accessed in one place making it simple to access to call history, Facebook, Twitter, messaging, and the like. Four-corner control also gets a mention and is basically user-customizable shortcut icons placed — not surprisingly — in each corner of the device’s 2.5-inch QVGA touchscreen display. Both phones’ launch dates are set for sometime in Q2 this year.

PRESS RELEASE

Get Compact and Clever with Sony Ericsson Xperia™ X10 mini and Xperia™ X10 mini pro

•  Sony Ericsson grows its family of Communication Entertainment phones with compact versions of Xperia™ X10 for the first half of 2010
•  Xperia™ X10 mini and X10 mini pro define a new user experience – ultra-compact – whilst still offering best-in-class communication entertainment performance
•  Smaller than a credit card, smart and unique with Sony Ericsson Timescape™ application and an intuitive 4 corner touch screen user interface

February 14, 2010 – Barcelona – Today sees the announcement of Xperia™ X10 mini and X10 mini pro, compact versions of Xperia™ X10, which will deliver powerful and application packed mobile phones into the industry. By introducing mobile phones that are both compact and clever, Sony Ericsson is challenging the norm and defining a brand new offering that combines high specification features with a version of Sony Ericsson’s powerful UX platform specifically designed for smaller devices.
Xperia™ X10 mini and X10 mini pro with slide out QWERTY keyboard offer an open and intuitive communication entertainment experience and build on the human curvature design philosophy debuted by the Sony Ericsson Xperia™ X10. Combining the Android platform with signature applications and a customisable UX platform, communication truly becomes entertainment with these new mobile phones. To enhance the experience, pick and choose from a multitude of applications at Android Market™ and co-create a mobile phone experience that is entirely unique. Users can go one step further and customise the home screen’s four corners and widgets to access the most needed applications for limitless possibilities.
The two sister mobile phones incorporate the signature application Sony Ericsson Timescape™ which brings all communication together in one place so users can see at a glance text messages, missed calls, and Facebook™ and Twitter updates, without having to open lots of different applications. The interactive music player also uses the “infinite button” to pull together all music content from the music store and YouTube™ – a smart way to search for new tracks from a favourite artist.
“There has been an enormous buzz around Xperia™ X10 so it is really exciting to be already unveiling compact versions of this powerful proposition.” Said Rikko Sakaguchi, EVP and Chief Creation Officer, Sony Ericsson. “With the X10 mini and X10 mini pro we have pushed the boundaries of what is possible with smaller devices and are giving consumers exactly what they want; two high performance mobile phones with a fully customisable user experience platform and a stunning ultra-compact design.”
Xperia™ X10 mini and X10 mini pro

• Sony Ericsson Timescape™ – brings together all communication in one place
• Four corner control – applications, calls, web, the consumer decides. Four customisable icons for ultimate control
• 5 megapixel camera and video – share creations via the web
• Music player links to music stores and YouTube™ – access the world of music
• Android platform – with Google™ services and Android Market™
• QWERTY keyboard – slide and text for quick and easy messaging (Xperia™ X10 mini pro only)

X10 mini and X10 mini pro supports HSPA 900/2100 and EDGE 850/900/1800/1900, HSPA 850/1900/2100 and EDGE 850/900/1800/1900.
The X10 mini will be available in selected markets from Q2 in the colours Pearl White, Black, Pink, Lime, Red and Silver
The X10 mini pro will be available in selected markets from Q2 in the colours Black and Red.
Sony Ericsson is also introducing the Portable Stereo Speakers MS450, to deliver rich on-the-go sound and the Hi-Fi Headset MH810 with remote with superior audio and remote media and call handling.
Xperia™ X10 mini and X10 mini pro

Camera
5 megapixel camera
Auto focus
Geo tagging
Photo and video light
Sony Ericsson Album application
Video recording

Music
Bluetooth™ stereo (A2DP)
Music player
PlayNow™
TrackID™

Web
Bookmarks
Pan and zoom
WebKit web browser

Communication
Sony Ericsson Timescape™ with…
- Facebook™ status updates, friend’s photo, inbox messages and friend requests
- tweets, replies and direct messages from people you follow on Twitter™
- incoming text and picture messages
- missed calls

Messaging
Email
Instant messaging
Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync®
Picture messaging (MMS)
Predictive text input
Text messaging (SMS)

Design
Auto rotate
Full slide out keyboard (X10 mini pro only)
Picture wallpaper
Touchscreen
Entertainment
Infinite button
Quadrapop game
Sony Ericsson FM radio
Video player
Video streaming

Organiser
Calendar
Flight mode
Phone book with dialer
Sony Ericsson Home with widget
Tasks

Location-based services
A-GPS
Google Maps™
Wisepilot™ turn-by-turn navigation* (free trial version)

Connectivity
3.5 mm audio jack
Bluetooth™ technology
Micro USB connector
NeoReader® barcode scanning app
Sony Ericsson Sync
USB mass storage support
USB support
Wi-Fi™
Google™ Services
Android Market™
Gmail™
Google Maps™ with Street View
Google Search Widget
Google Talk™
Google Voice Search™**** The Google Voice Search service is not available in all markets
YouTube™
Screen
16,777,216 colour TFT touchscreen
2.55 inches
240 x 320 pixels (QVGA)
Scratch-resistant
Accessories
In-Box:

• Sony Ericsson Xperia™ X10 mini/ Xperia™ X10 mini pro with battery
• Micro USB cable for charging, synchronisation and file transfer
• Stereo portable handsfree
• 2GB microSD™ memory card
• User documentation

Optional:

• Portable Stereo Speakers MS450
• Hi-Fi Headset with Remote MH810

Facts
Xperia™ X10 mini:
Size: 83 x 50 x 16 mm
Weight: 88 grams
Phone memory: Up to 128MB
Memory card support: SanDisk microSD™, up to 16 GB
Memory card included: 2GB
Operating system: Google™ Android 1.6
Processor: 600 MHz Qualcomm MSM7227
Talk time GSM/GPRS: Up to 4 hours
Standby time: GSM/GPRS: Up to 285hrs
Talk time UMTS: Up to 3.5 hours
Standby time: UMTS: Up to 360 hrs
Xperia™ X10 mini pro:
Size: 90 x 52 x 17 mm
Weight: 120 grams
Phone memory: Up to 128MB
Memory card support: SanDisk microSD™, up to 16 GB
Memory card included: 2GB
Operating system: Google™ Android 1.6
Processor: 600 MHz Qualcomm MSM7227
Talk time GSM/GPRS: Up to 4 hours
Standby time: GSM/GPRS: Up to 285hrs
Talk time UMTS: Up to 3.5 hours
Standby time: UMTS: Up to 360 hrs
Availability and versions

Networks
UMTS HSPA 900/2100
GSM GPRS/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900
UMTS HSPA 850/1900/2100
GSM GPRS/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900
Available in selected markets in Q2 2010

Colour
Xperia™ X10 mini:
Black
Pearl White
Lime
Pink
Red
Silver
Xperia™ X10 mini pro:
Black