Nokia Is Going Down!

It’s official, Nokia is going down. The one time telecom giant, who had its reputed products spread over 50 countries, has announced a cut of 10,000 jobs, and a shutdown of 3 facilities, by the end of 2013.



The Finnish Telecom Manufacturers three senior executives will also be departing from the company. The closing facilities include a research center, a factory in Germany, Canada and in its home land Finland.

The company had issued a warning to investors that its loss was likely to be greater in the second quarter of this year. It had posted a loss of $1.2 billion in the first quarter of 2012. Nokia also said the negative effects of its transition to a Windows-based Smartphone business would continue into the third quarter.

Once an undisputed leader in the mobile phone market, Nokia lose its charm over the years to Apple, Samsung and other handset makers based on Android.

The company, which announced its partnership with Microsoft in 2011 for making a range of Windows based Smartphones has since then saw a steep decline of sales and profit loss, mainly due to people and operators avoiding Nokia’s own Symbian based devices.
Nokia also announced the sale of its luxury handset business, Vertu to a European firm. With its streamlining efforts, the company is planning to save €1.6 billion by the end of 2013.

“These planned reductions are a difficult consequence of the intended actions we believe we must take to ensure Nokia’s long-term competitive strength,” said Stephen Elop, the Nokia chief executive and a former Microsoft executive. “We do not make plans that may impact our employees lightly, and as a company we will work tirelessly to ensure that those at risk are offered the support, options and advice necessary to find new opportunities.”

Last week, rumors about a Microsoft takeover had made Nokia’s sinking shares rose six percent.

 
“The cost savings and job cuts were intended to return Nokia to profitability “as soon as possible,” Elop said.

Know the Unknown Features of Galaxy S3

Samsung Galaxy S3 is the hottest buzz in the smartphone market. We all know that this new flagship phone of the company has lots of unique hardware featureslike quad-core processor, wireless charging and more. The phone also features some interesting software features that make it even more special. Read on and know more about these specs and its usage.

 
‘Smart Stay’ Tracks your Eye to Keep the Phone Awake

 
This new feature tracks you eye movement and adjust the screen brightness of your smartphone. It gives a new experience while browsing web and using apps as the screen will never time out if you are looking at it. The phone uses its front camera to track your eye movements and this functionality happen.

‘Direct Call’ Understands You

 
This insightful feature in this phone is unique and clever; it understands what you wish to do.  If you are texting your friend and suddenly realizes that calling will be better, you just have to keep you phone near you ears and it will automatically dial you friend’s number.  This feature makes use of the proximity sensors in the phone.

‘Pop Up Play’ Lets you Multitask

 
Galaxy S3 allows you to do multitasking with this feature that lets you open two or more apps at the same time. Pop Up Play lets you watch video on a tiny window when you are working on some other app. For time being this size if tiny window is fixed and the feature is restricting to video playback.

‘Buddy Share’ Connects the Dots

 
Buddy Share is an interesting feature that asks for identification of a person whenever you click a photograph. And once you filled the details it will search for that person in you contact and will do all the needed updations about that person.

‘S Voice’ to Argue with Siri

 
This feature is meant to compete with Apple’s intelligent personal assistant and knowledge navigator application software that got lunched with iPhone 4S dubbed as ‘Siri’. Samsung believes that this feature will be a selling factor for the phone, as the Siri has been for iPhone 4S.


‘Smart Alert’ Alerts you a Lot

 
This real-time usability of this feature can’t be estimated now. But of the time being this is a new feature which makes the smartphone vibrate to alert you that you have a miss all or message when you pick it up. Other smartphone already have LED notification to alert you about the same things, Samsung is just doing it in a different way

Samsung unveils Windows 8-based tablets, notebooks

South Korea's Samsung Electronicsunveiled notebook and tablet computers running on Windows 8, the latest firm to showcase products that use Microsoft's eagerly-awaited new operating system.

On the opening day of Asia's leading IT fair inTaipei, Samsung showcased the products, including the Series 5 Hybrid which has features of both a laptop and a tablet, in a low-key display.

"Visitors should be able to see the tight partnership between Samsung and Microsoft and Intel," said Lorraine Tsao, a spokeswoman for Samsung in Taiwan.

It came a day after Taiwanese rivals Acer and Asus unveiled products running on Windows 8, which is the focus of the annual Computex fair, in its 32nd year.

A new survey meanwhile showed that Samsung overtook Amazon in the first three months of the year to take second spot in the global market for tablet sales, but still lagged far behind Apple with its ever-popular iPad.

Windows 8 is touted as Microsoft's long-awaited riposte to the rise of Apple and mobile devices powered by Google's Android operating system. There is no official release date but reports have predicted an October launch.

Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer says that Windows 8 will support a wider range of devices including touch- and stylus-based smartphones and tablet PCs, as well as desktops and laptops.

The ABI Research survey, out Monday, showed that the iPad extended its lead in the global market for tablets in the first three months of the year, holding 65 per cent of the market with 11.8 million shipments of the device.

Samsung grabbed the number two spot with 1.1 million shipments, or six percent of the market, overtaking Amazon, which saw an 80 per cent quarter-over-quarter drop in sales of the Kindle Fire, according to ABI.

Computex features more than 1,800 exhibitors registering 5,400 booths, up two per cent from a year ago.

The organisers estimate that the IT fair will draw 36,000 foreign buyers who may place bulk orders worth up to $28 billion.

Samsung to build $1.9 bln logic chip line

Samsung Electronics Co(005930.KS), the world's No.2 chipmaker, said it will spend $1.9 billion to build a new logic chip line to make processors for mobile devices as demand grows for smartphones and tablets.

Samsung, which makes application processors for Apple's (AAPL.O) iPhone and iPad - which rival its own Galaxy and Note devices - said the new line will use 300 mm wafers and 20 nanometer and 14 nanometer processing technology.

The South Korean firm is aggressively pumping up production of logic chips, as growth in the mobile device market outpaces weak computer sales. Demand for system chips used in smartphones and tablets is set to more than double to $59 billion in 2016 from $23 billion last year, according to research firm Gartner.

In a statement, Samsung said the new line - which it hopes to complete by the end of next year - would help meet growing demand for "smart mobile solutions".

The investment plan follows Samsung's recent decision to build its first chip manufacturing plant in China to make NAND type flash memory chips, which analysts estimate will cost some 4-5 trillion won.

Ahead of the announcement, shares in Asia's biggest technology firm closed up 5.2 percent in a broad market rally that sent the benchmark KOSPI index up 2.6 percent.

Is Microsoft about to acquire Nokia?

Finnish telecom giant Nokia, considered among the most trusted brands in India, is going through a bad patch with its shares at an all-time low, triggering speculation that it may be acquired by Microsoft.

Once the most valuable companies in Europe, the mobile telecom equipment firm has seen its share prices fall to 2.20 euros in recent days -- the lowest since the mid-1990s.

The weekly Helsinki Times in its latest edition said the Nokia stocks were now below book value -- a situation described as "worth more dead than alive" rhetorically.

"The investment community is fertile ground for rumours, and there are plenty about what could happen to Nokia. One of the most persistent rumours is that Microsoft may buy the company," the weekly said.

"The alliance with Microsoft is a powerful one. Maybe Apple and Google have already won the mobile-phone business, and everyone else is doomed," it said in a report, quoting The Wall streetJournal.

"But that's what they once said about Nokia. Things change in this industry. Microsoft, which is desperate to play catch-up in smart-phones, could buy Nokia today out of petty cash."

The Bill Gates-led US software and tech giant has about 46 billion euros in cash equivalent, while Nokia's market value is 8.4 billion euros, the weekly said, adding there was no speculation on any other buyer for Nokia, ruling out Apple, Samsung or RIM.

It also suggested that Nokia could try to reverse its fortunes with bold steps.

Hardware details of the next iPhone (N41AP / iPhone5,1) and more on the new Maps app

We have already laid out a lot about the next iPhone. Its 1,136-by-640 display. Its totally redesigned back plate and unibody construction. But what will it have under the hood? 9to5Mac delved deep into a beta version of iOS 6 to find out…

 

The iPhone running iOS 6 boasts Darwin Kernel Version 13.0.0. We can also see that the processor is an ARM S5L8950X.Interestingly, that is a full release above the most current developer version of MAC OS 10.8 Mountain Lion. The XNU build is also higher (21XX vs 2050.5.8):

The Samsung 5L8950X ARM processor is most likely manufactured at the same fab in Austin where Apple’s other Ax processors are built. The S5L8950X is a step up from the S5L8940X on the previous iPhone and the S5L8945X on the ‘new’ iPad but we’re not sure what that means in terms of cores, processor speed or fab size. We’d place our money on a low power dual core processor similar to the new iPad 2 on Samsung’s 32nm fab.

The processor is known internally at Apple as the “A5-***” (the last three characters were removed to protect our source). This will most likely not be the final name. However, it seems probable that the processor will continue carrying the “A5″ name and will not step up to the “A6″ nomenclature—but that is far from certain.

As for GPU, the new iPhone also features something entirely new. The GPU chip, which will continue to be part of the SoC, is called “SGX543RC*” (the asterisk is another sensitive number that could identify people working on the device). This GPU technically does not exist yet and we don’t have specs.

The next iPhone will now have 1GB of RAM, which seems to do well for the new iPad.

This unit runs 6.0 seed 10A33X with iBoot version iBoot-153x.x (iOS 5.* has an iBoot version of iBoot-12xx.x.x, depending on the device and version).

It is also interesting that some prototypes of this device use the older Qualcomm Baseband chips. This unit uses the same type of Qualcomm baseband found in the cellular-enabled ‘new’ iPad 4G units. Our source indicated this might be because he/she does not need access to any new baseband that they might use. Moreover, the battery life is not a concern, because this unit must always stay plugged-in. We expect the final N41AP / iPhone5,1 to carry the latest Gobi chips. These chips should allow low-power voice/data on a variety of mobile networks, including China Mobile’s TD-LTE.

We are told Apple is far along in its iOS 6 development, so an October new iPhone deadline should be relatively easy—barring any unforeseen chip, part shortages/labor outages, etc. So ‘easy’, in fact, that an earlier release is possible.

Finally, there is more clarification on the new iOS Maps app that is abandoning Google for Apple’s own tiles. We have an early/redacted screenshot that will likely undergo many changes (fonts, etc.) before it gets real:

You will note that contrary to the previous report, the GPS/Compass icon on the iPhone is not connected to a 3D icon. We were told that in the iPhone version of Maps, the 3D button is now under the bottom right scroll/menu to avoid accidentally hitting the wrong button. With that said, 3D maps are something used more on the iPad than an iPhone, which is often used for directions. Also, the buttons are bigger on the iPad making it easier not to accidentally hit the wrong button.

We have a lot more information that will come over the next two weeks including an entirely new iOS app from Apple. So, stay tuned!

Samsung Galaxy S3 hits store shelves in India

Samsung Electronics launched its flagship Galaxy S3 smartphone in India on Thursday, making an aggressive push to counter Apple's popular iPhones in a competitive market.

The 16 GB smartphone, priced at 43,180 rupees in India, runs on the Android 4.0 platform and features a 4.8 inch screen.

The Galaxy S3, powered by Samsung's quad-core microprocessor, also tracks the user's eye movements to keep the screen from dimming or turning off while in use.

Samsung packs new features such as the S Voice, its equivalent of Apple's Siri, and launched its own music service on the device. The S3 also boasts of an 8 megapixel rear camera.

"India is one of the top three strategic markets in the world for Samsung," a company release quoted H.C. Ryu, Samsung's vice president of sales and marketing, as saying at the phone's launch in India.

The company is aiming to outsell its previous model S2 that helped the South Korean firm topple Apple as the world's largest smartphone maker.