Analyst says Nokia isn’t going to recover, the company should be broken up

Credit Suisse, one of the largest financial services companies in the world, recently told investors that they’ve lost confidence in Nokia. They say the stock is likely going to hit 1.60 EUR ($2.07), and that Windows Phone 8 isn’t going to fix the Finnish handset maker’s problems. Their most bold suggestion, by far, is that Nokia should split itself up:

“Apple may be interested in Nokia’s IP (intellectual property). Ericsson, Huawai, ZTE may be interested in parts of Nokia Seimens Networks. No company would likely be interested in the entire company with its 114,000 employees.”

So what do we make of all this? Let’s look at the facts. Nokia sold 4 million Windows Phones during the second quarter of 2012. They’re going to announce how many Windows Phones they sold during Q3 in roughly three weeks. In July, Microsoft held an event where they showed off parts of Windows Phone 8, but more importantly they finally confirmed to the world that today’s Windows Phone aren’t going to get updated to the latest version of the OS.

In early September, Nokia held an event to show off two new Windows Phone 8 devices, but they forgot to mention how much they were going to cost and when they’re going to come out. Which brings to last week, when week Nokia finally issued some press releases that said we’re not going to see any of their Windows Phone 8 handsets until mid November. The high end device, the Lumia 920, will cost 650 EUR, which is what’s expected of a flagship phone. The Lumia 820 on the other hand, the “budget” model, is priced at 500 EUR, and that’s simply too much.

Microsoft gives Nokia $250 million every quarter to stay alive, but Nokia is burning through that at a rate that isn’t sustainable. If these new Lumia phones don’t break sales records, we honestly don’t know if the company can stick it out until the end of 2013.

Windows Phone 8 signed off for RTM

Microsoft’s long awaited next generation mobile OS, Windows Phone 8 has finally been signed off for RTM. RTM here stands for Release to Manufacturing. This means that the OS is now code-complete and just needs to undergo testing on carriers and phones before being launched on devices.

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Reuters: The Nokia Lumia 920 will go on sale in November

Earlier this week, on Wednesday, Nokia unveiled two Windows Phone 8 devices: the Lumia 820 and the Lumia 920. The Finnish handset maker failed to provide any guidance regarding pricing or availability, but according to a piece published on Reuters, the Lumia 920 will go on sale during the second half of November. If you’re surprised, well … don’t be. We’ve known for a long time now that Microsoft is going to hold their own event to launch Windows Phone 8. Rumor has it it’s going to take place on the 29th of October. Handling the logistics of a launch means you need to add a week or two for distributors to do their thing, so mid-November sounds just about right. You’ve got to remember, last year the Nokia Lumia 800 launched on November 16th. So a one year anniversary isn’t such a bad thing. Continue reading “Reuters: The Nokia Lumia 920 will go on sale in November”

BigFlix launches Windows Phone application

Reliance Entertainment’s BigFlix VoD service has launched its Windows Phone app. The app features trailers, short films and full length movies allowing subscribers to watch movies and other content from BigFlix’s 1000+ movie catalog on the go.

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Microsoft and Nokia to hold a press conference in New York on the same day as Nokia World

Nokia World, the company’s annual event where they show off at least one new major device, is going to take place in Helsinki, Finland this year on September 5th. This is something we’ve known for quite a while. Last night the Finnish handset maker began sending out invitations to another press event, one in New York City, which is also due to take place on September 5th. Besides being on the other side of the pond, this American event looks to be different than the European event because Microsoft will be there. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what all this means: Windows Phone 8 devices are going to get announced. Stephen Elop, Nokia’s CEO, recently confirmed this according to Reuters, who quotes him as saying Windows Phone 8 hardware will be released in the “relatively near term”. Speaking about Elop, which event do you think he’ll attend? The one in Finland or the one in America?

Looking back at Nokia World 2011, that took place on October 26th. It’s where Nokia showed off their first two Windows Phones, the Lumia 800 and the Lumia 710. The former hit the European market in mid November, the latter shipped about a month later. Assuming Nokia keeps the same timetable of announcing something and then making sure it’s on store shelves roughly three weeks later, then by the end of next month we should be able to get our hands on Nokia’s first Windows Phone 8 device. Curiously, the third week of September is when HTC is allegedly going to show off their Windows Phone 8 handsets as well.

What does Windows Phone 8 actually bring to the table? We don’t really know too much about the new consumer facing features, what we do know however is that Windows Phone 8 adds support for dual core chips, NFC, 720p resolution screens, and native code.

Expect Microsoft to show off a whole lot more in New York.

Rumor: HTC to unveil Windows Phone 8 devices in late September

In less than four weeks Nokia is going to hold their annual “Nokia World” event where it’s widely expected that the Finnish handset maker will unveil devices running Microsoft’s Windows Phone 8 operating system. According to a report from the Chinese website WPDang, HTC is also going to show off some Windows Phone 8 hardware, though obviously not at Nokia’s event. They say HTC will hold two events, one in New York, the other in London, during the third week of September. At said events they’re going to show off between one and three Windows Phone 8 devices. Continue reading “Rumor: HTC to unveil Windows Phone 8 devices in late September”

List of Windows Phone 8 Bluetooth profiles revealed

The Bluetooth SIG has finally posted the Bluetooth profile list supported by Windows Phone 8 and it looks like the number of profiles supported has improved quite a bit compared to Windows Phone 7. Addition of the OBEX (Object Exchange) profile means that the phone should theoretically be able to both send and receive objects though specifics around that remain to be revealed.

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Microsoft renames Windows Phone Marketplace to Windows Phone Store

As part of its rebranding and simplification efforts, Microsoft plans to rename Windows Phone Marketplace to Windows Phone Store on its smartphones. The new branding is expected to be rolled out with Windows Phone 7.8 on current devices and with Windows Phone 8 on next gen smartphones.

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Microsoft and Sharp enter licensing deal to use exFAT file system in Android devices

Microsoft has patent licensing agreements with most of the Android device manufacturers out there. The latest addition is Sharp which is licensing Microsoft’s exFAT file system for use in Android devices.


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Micromax Superfone Infinity A80 with 2500 mAh battery now available in India for Rs. 8,490

Micromax Superfone Infinity A80, its new phone in the Superfone series with a whopping 2500 mAh battery is now available from online retailer nCarry. This is their first phone in the Superfone series with the Marathon battery. It is a Dual-SIM phone that has 3.75-inch TFT Touch Screen display and is powered by 800 MHz Processor. It has 5MP camera with flash and a 0.3 MP front facing camera. It runs on Android 2.3 (Gingerbread). Continue reading “Micromax Superfone Infinity A80 with 2500 mAh battery now available in India for Rs. 8,490”

Windows Phone app store crosses 100,000 apps

At the Windows Phone Summit, Microsoft informed devs that the app store has crossed 100,000 apps. With the upcoming shared core between Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, we should expect a much more exciting app scene for Windows Phone. Developers are now free to use native code for development making it easier to port apps to Windows Phone.

“Lumia customers can expect thousands more apps to be introduced across Windows Phone platform. The announcements underline the progress Nokia is making with the Lumia family of smartphones and in building a winning ecosystem with Microsoft. It shows how the Windows Phone experience continues to evolve at a faster pace than the competition and how Nokia’s continued investments in great location-based services benefit partners, developers and consumers.”

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jsLcPFlM9M

Microsoft is making a lot of under-the-hood changes to allow developers access to more features. Case in point, speech recognition will be available for each and every app to use. Easier development means more and better apps which in the end is great for consumers.

Video : Microsoft demos new Windows Phone 8 start screen

To better demonstrate the new start screen on Windows Phone 8 devices, Microsoft has uploaded a short video demo. While i was personally quite skeptical at first, the new layout definitely seems to be better in terms of displaying notifications.

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Current Windows Phone devices to get WP 7.8 update with new start screen

Windows Phone users who are feeling shafted post the Windows Phone 8 announcement can sleep a bit easier tonight. While they still won’t be getting the complete update due to the sweeping changes in the backend, they will still get the new user interface which is one of the more obvious changes in the OS.

The new interface allows users to resize app tiles. Three specific sizes have been defined by Microsoft. Small, Medium and large which would correspond to  1×1 , 2×2 and 4×2  in terms of spaces on the icon grid. Unfortunately apps compiled just for Windows Phone 8 will not be backwards compatible which doesn’t bode too well for current users. In addition there are expected to be some other Windows Phone 8 features which should make their way back to the WP 7.8 update which the company will reveal closer to launch.  Continue reading “Current Windows Phone devices to get WP 7.8 update with new start screen”

Microsoft announces Windows Phone 8, Details 8 major features

Microsoft just unveiled the latest version of its mobile operating system. Called Windows Phone 8, it brings sweeping changes to the OS leaving current users out of the party for the most part. We’ll be detailing the features coming to existing phones in a separate post but for now lets take a look at the features to be a part of the next gen OS.

Do note that this is not a complete list and Microsoft is still holding back some cards for closer to the launch.  Continue reading “Microsoft announces Windows Phone 8, Details 8 major features”

Comparison : Microsoft Surface Windows RT vs Surface Windows 8 Pro

Microsoft today announced its first series of self manufactured tablets under the name of Surface. They bring in unique hardware features like an inbuilt kickstand and a high end Magnesium casing. Two separate models will be available at launch. While one will run on Windows RT, the other is a full blown Intel tablet running on Windows 8 Pro.

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