Samsung's much awaited smartphone, Galaxy S2 will launch in India on June 3 through Vodafone at Rs. 32,850. Customers can pre-book their phones online at Rs. 1000, starting May 26. Customers will also get 1GB data free for the first six months. The phone will be available in Samsung stores from June 9.
The announcement comes on the heels of the launch of the iPhone 4 in India. The iPhone 4 will be available in India from May 27 and with a first of its kind reverse subsidy plan from Airtel and Aircel. Following an upfront payment of Rs. 34,500 for the 16GB model and Rs. 40,900 for the 32GB model, customers will have the opportunity to recover 100 per cent of their upfront iPhone cost in monthly credits on their service plan over a period of 24 months
The Galaxy S2 is a premium Android based handset that will also battle arch-rival LG's recently launched Optimus 2X. It is marginally expensive than the Optimus 2X and about Rs. 2000 cheaper than the entry level iPhone 4.
The phone features a 1.2 Ghz dual core processor, that is the fastest of its kind in any phone available in India. It also sports a high resolution 4.3-inch AMOLED display and an 8 MP camera. India will only get the 16 GB version of the phone.
Chinese mobile handset maker G'Five Mobiles Tuesday said it will launch its range of third generation (3G) enabled Android and Windows based tablet computing device in India for less than Rs.10,000 by June-end.
"G'Five plans to launch its range of tablet computing devices in Indian market by the end of this business quarter which is end of Jun, 2011. Our business philosophy is to make technology affordable to the common people," Arshit Pathak, managing director of Kingtech Electronics India Private Ltd, a group company of G'Five International, told IANS. "Both the Android and Windows-based tablet computing devices shall be launched in India. The two android models shall be introduced in sizes of 7 inches and 10 inches.
The Windows model shall be 10 inches in size. These shall be WiFi and 3G powered and the price range will be below Rs.10,000, shattering the price barrier once again," he added.
Today, the company has presence in 45,000 retail outlets across the country along with over 500 direct service centres across the country. "G'Five has ambitious plans for launching other consumer electronics products in 2011 as well including tablet computing devices, net books, laptops, music boxes, digital photo frames etc." the company said in a statement. It is also seeking more channel partners across the country including tier II and tier III cities part from tying up with retail operators especially large format retail who have chain of stores across the country.
In the recent International Data Corporation (IDC) report - IDC's India Quarterly Mobile Handsets Tracker, 3Q, 2010, the company was ranked as the second largest selling mobile phone brand in India after Nokia, replacing Samsung at the second spot.
Apple recently launched Apple iPad 2 with Wi-Fi at a starting range of Rs.29,500 for 16 GB model.
China had more than 900 million mobile phone subscribers at the end of April with nearly two-thirds of the world's most populous nation using cellular technology, the government said Tuesday.
The nation's army of mobile phone users grew by over 41 million in the first quarter of 2011, bringing the total number of cell phone subscribers to 900.39 million, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said.
Mobile phone use has exploded in China in recent years as handset prices and user charges have dropped, while the continual arrival of new technologies on the market has spurred sales.
According to government figures, China had 565 million mobile phone subscribers in February 2009.
In the first quarter of 2011, China's telecommunication industry reported a 9.4 percent growth year-on-year on business revenue valued at 308.36 billion yuan ($47.44 billion), the ministry said.
As of the end of April, third generation (3G) mobile telecommunication users in China reached 67.57 million, nearly 21 million more than at the end of 2010.
Last week, the ministry announced the number of Internet users in China, already the world's largest online market, hit 477 million at the end of March.
The number of people using the Internet in China had hit 457 million at the end of 2010, meaning that more than one-third of its 1.3 billion-strong population were online.
Aircel and Airtel have today announced that they will launch Apple's largest selling smartphone, the iPhone 4 in India on May 27. A new pricing structure will be in place for the device to cater to both the prepaid and post paid customers. The new pricing model allows customers to recover the upfront cost of their iPhone on select plans over the course of 24 months, making iPhone in India more affordable than ever.
The service providers will provide customers with a range of flexible service plans for both post-paid and pre-paid mobile customers. Following an upfront payment of Rs. 34,500 for the 16GB model and Rs. 40,900 for the 32GB model, customers will have the opportunity to recover 100 percent of their upfront iPhone cost in monthly credits on their service plan over a period of 24 months.
Powered by Apple's A4, the iPhone 4 boasts of a retina display, FaceTime for video chat, 5MP rear facing camera with LED flash and HD video recording. Apple's App Store provides access to more than 350,000 apps.
"We are very proud to bring iPhone 4 to Aircel customers in India," said Mr. Sandip Das, Director, Aircel. "We always endeavour to bring to our consumers a world class experience and offer the best in innovation and service. With a robust roll out of Aircel 's 3G services in 13 circles across India, the launch of iPhone 4 will allow our consumers to truly savour the 3G experience. With our incredible new price plans, we aim to make iPhone more affordable than ever."
Microsoft has announced the latest version of their Windows Phone operating system. Codenamed 'Mango' the latest release will be known as Windows Phone 7.1.
As announced earlier, the 7.1 update features more than 500 new features. Some of the new features include 'threads' for messaging, Facebook, email and Windows Live Messenger, deeper integration with social networks and hands free messaging.
Full multi-tasking has been added with a card like interface and apps will now intelligently hibernate improving the power consumption of Windows Phone smartphones.
Microsoft also pointed out that they have improved upon the inbuilt Office app which will now provide a desktop class experience. Corporate customers will have access to Office 365, which will be available on subscription basis.
Microsoft has even integrated a version of Internet Explorer 9 that supports HTML 5 and full hardware acceleration. Additional features like Local Scout will provide hyper-local search results.
The newly redesigned Bing features Bing Vision, Music Search and Voice.
Cloud integration on Windows Phone 7.1 includes Sky Drive which will now hold up-to 25 GB of data.
For gamers Windows Phone 7.1 has redesigned the Xbox live hub, which now features a more social experience, and greater customization options for Xbox live 'Avatars' similar to that on the Xbox 360.
The 'live tiles' in the operating system have been upgraded and will provide real time information related to the apps without opening them.
Samsung, HTC and LG will launch new Windows Phone 7.1 devices with new partners Acer, ZTE and Fujitsu. Notably Microsoft also mentioned their partnership with Nokia is already bearing fruit and they have Nokia Windows Phone 7.1 devices in their test labs. Though, the company did not announce any particular device.
The Windows Phone 7.1 update will be available for free to all current Windows Phone 7 customers this fall and will come preloaded on all new Windows Phone powered smartphones.
f you think the magical multi-touch technology powering your iPhone is cool, then you really need to take a look at what the researchers at the Hasso-Plattner Institute have been getting up to.
How does an Imaginary Smartphone sound? Technology developed at the Hasso-Plattner Institute in Germany literally turns your palm into a touch screen smartphone.
They have developed an ingenious camera tracking technology powered by a wearable depth camera that allows users to use their palm like a touch screen while inputs are transferred to the phone over Wi-Fi. Amazingly the entire process does not require any visual or physical feedback, only depending on your muscle memory and your personal ability to operate the phone blindly.
Previously, Massachusetts Institute of Technology had also unveiled a similar 'Sixth Sense' gestural interface technology - a gesture based interface for controlling mobile phones through a user's palm. In this technology, a camera was used for tracking gestures but we could also see a user interface popping up on the palm using a small projector.
Is this the next step in the evolution of touch screen interfaces?
Watch the videos below to see the technology used by Hasso-Plattner Institute and MIT.
Recently US retail website jr.com listed the Honeycomb based Toshiba Tablet for pre-order at a price of $579 (Rs. 26,000 approx.) sparking speculation of its imminent launch.
The tablet, that was first shown at CES 2011, features standard offerings for Honeycomb based tablets, i.e. 1GHz Dual Core Tegra 2 processor, 10.1-inch display with a resolution of 1200x800, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 3.0. The front of the device houses a 2MP camera for video chatting and the rear has a 5MP autofocus camera that can record video in 720p. The device will be available in 8GB and 32GB variants.
The 8GB version is expected to cost $450 that is $50 cheaper than the 16GB Wi-Fi only iPad and the 32GB version will cost $579.
The first Android Honeycomb based tablet to hit store shelves in the US was the Motorola Xoom. The first to hit the Indian stores is the Acer ICONIA A500. The Samsung Galaxy 8.9 and 10.1 are expected to hit store shelves soon. Amazon is also expected to launch their Android tablets in 2011.
Toshiba is just the latest in a line of manufacturers trying to take Apple's iPad.
Speaking at the Microsoft developer conference in Japan, CEO Steve Ballmer announced that the Windows Phone 7 mobile operating system will receive over 500 new features with the Mango update.
He also announced that a slew of new Windows Phone OEMs and carriers will be revealed at the May 24 'Windows Phone' event
The Mango update is slated to bring full multi-tasking capabilities to the Windows Phone operating system with a card-like UI, similar to the one seen on HP's webOS. Extended Microsoft Office support will also be added including Office 365, SharePoint and Sky drive to woo corporate customers. Enhanced Xbox live integration is expected with support for Kinect too.
Previously, rumor mills were buzzing with the impeding announcement of new Windows Phone hardware. We are yet to see a dual core powered Windows Phone device and reportedly Microsoft was planning on adopting the ST Ericsson dual-core processor for the Nokia Windows Phone devices. To date, we have only seen QUALCOMM Snapdragon processor powered Windows Phone devices.
So what exactly are the 500 new features Steve Ballmer was talking about? Watch this space for updates.
