Mobiles reviews - General

Sony Ericsson to launch Bravia-branded mobile phones in India

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 16:19:27 +0000

With 62.5% market share Nokia is the dominant mobile phone maker in India. Sony Ericsson holds 13% of the market and to tackle the competition, the Swedish-Japanese handset maker plans to release the Bravia-branded mobile phones in the country. Sony Ericsson already sells Walkman and Cyber-shot branded handsets world wide, while Bravia mobile phones are at [...]

Brazil’s newest mobile operator Unicel to launch in Sao Paulo in September

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 01:16:15 +0000

Brazil’s newest mobile operator Unicel plans to launch commercial services in Sao Paulo metropolitan area on September 7th, under the brand name Aeiou. Unicel acquired a GSM licence in October of last year for BRL 93.8 million ($60 million), and is now looking to attract 500,000 subscribers in its first year of operations. So far the company [...]

Turkcell to acquire 80% of Belarus’ BeST

Fri, 08 Aug 2008 07:28:00 +0000

Turkey’s largest mobile operator Turkcell is to acquire an 80% stake in state-owned BeST (Belarusian Telecommunications Network) for $500 million. Turkcell will pay $300 million up front followed by two further payments of $100 million at the end of 2009 and 2010, respectively. An additional $100 million will be paid when BeST records a full-year positive [...]

Lending mobile phones to friends soon to be illegal in Sri Lanka

Mon, 04 Aug 2008 07:07:55 +0000

Sri Lanka’s government has some weird ideas. Back in February, we saw them blocking SMS on independence day and now they want to ban mobile phone lending. The idea behind the move is to fight terrorism, “to avert irregularities and illegal activities while minimizing threats to national security created by the irresponsible use of telephones.” The [...]

Student spams 400 people with death threat in Russia

Wed, 30 Jul 2008 21:39:22 +0000

In Russia, a 20-year-old sent out four hundred death threats saying “Death to Russian pigs and to you, freak!” to random phone numbers. Authorities have reacted, catching the sender who was in fact Russian. His phone number was traced and he was arrested promptly. After he (Anton Shurubara) was caught, he said that he was joking [...]

iPhone 2.0 tip: Hold “.com” button for more options

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 10:54:24 +0000

If you’re running iPhone 2.0 firmware, or have an iPhone 3G which comes with the latest firmware version, you may’ve noticed a number of usability improvements. One thing that caught our eye is the quick way of “typing” domain name extensions. When you type in a URL, hold down the “.com” button to get a selection [...]

Swedish military okays TeliaSonera/France Telecom deal

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 16:53:29 +0000

Swedish military concluded that potential acquisition of TeliaSonera by France Telecom will not have security implications. Previously we've heard Swedish government, a 37% owner of TelaSonera, citing possible security concerns as reasons for not approving the deal. "The defence forces judge that a change of the ownership in TeliaSonera, provided that sufficient measures are taken to ensure [...]

Mobile picture books hit Japan

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 09:37:39 +0000

Back in October, we reported that Japanese novelists have found a new medium in mobile phones. Now, the trend goes further and we see a printing company launching its first mobile picture book. Apparently, these mobile picture books are designed to be read page by page, without much scrolling - just clicking from page to page. [...]

China Telecom to migrate to LTE withing next three years

Sun, 08 Jun 2008 22:15:31 +0000

China Telecom plans to migrate its newly-acquired CDMA mobile operation to LTE technology within the next three years. According to the company's CEO Wang Xiaochu, the operator will initially focus on rolling out EV-DO Rev. A in key cities before moving to LTE "in two to three years' time." Earlier we reported that China Telecom will [...]

China Unicom merge with China Netcom in a $56.3 billion deal

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 16:51:58 +0000

Consolidation of Chinese telecoms market is well underway. A week ago we reported that China Mobile Group is acquiring China Railcom, and now China Unicom is merging with fixed-line player China Netcom, while at the same time spinning off its CDMA business to China Telecom. The two companies are merging in a share swap deal valued [...]

Russia's MTS gets a new CEO - Mr. Mikhail Shamolin

Mon, 02 Jun 2008 10:31:17 +0000

Russia's Mobile TeleSystems announced the appointment of Mr. Mikhail Shamolin as President and CEO, who has served as the head of MTS Russia. Mr. Leonid Melamed, Shamolin's predecessor will be assuming the duties of President and CEO at Sistema, the largest private sector consumer services company in Russia and the majority shareholder of MTS. Under Mr. [...]

Two Indian companies enter the handset market

Mon, 02 Jun 2008 10:19:14 +0000

Two Indian companies have announced plans to enter the country's fast-growing mobile handset market by launching low-cost devices. According to India's Economic Times, the electronics and home appliances company Orpat is launching two new GSM handsets based on NXP Semiconductors' chips. It will promote the devices at its 50,000 retail outlets and is targeting sales of [...]

France Telecom getting serious about TeliaSonera; Wants to raise 10 billion EUR for the acquisition

Fri, 30 May 2008 15:49:03 +0000

France Telecom has reportedly approached a series of financial institutions to arrange a 10 billion EUR loan that will enable it to acquire TeliaSonera. The French telecom giant, which is also known as the owner of the Orange mobile group, has been negotiating with the Nordic operator for quite some time now. However, it seems [...]

ReCellular's a new mobile phone recycling campaign aims to raise money for American Red Cross

Thu, 29 May 2008 18:53:29 +0000

ReCellular recently announced a new mobile phone recycling campaign with the goal to raise a minimum of $50,000 for the American Red Cross. Apparently two in three Americans will replace their mobile phones with a newer model this year, and the vast majority of them will either keep their old phones in a junk drawer, or [...]

Japan wants to boost the MVNO market

Sun, 25 May 2008 16:00:28 +0000

Japan seems to want to boost the MVNO market, as the country's regulator called for mobile operators to disclose their network leasing prices. The regulator has reportedly also asked smaller players like eMobile, Willcom, and UQ Communications to reveal their prices as well. The move is designed to stimulate competition in the market, which continues to [...]