Apple releases new iPad in South Korea and 11 additional countries (USA)
Apple launched the new iPad, the third generation of its category defining mobile device, in South Korea and 11 additional countries on Friday, April 20. The new iPad features a stunning new Retina display, Apple’s new A5X chip with quad-core graphics and a 5 megapixel iSight camera with advanced optics for capturing amazing photos and 1080p HD video. The new iPad still delivers the same all-day 10 hour battery life while remaining amazingly thin and light.
In addition to South Korea, the new iPad also will be available beginning on Friday, April 20 in Brunei, Croatia, Cyprus, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Malaysia, Panama, St Maarten, Uruguay and Venezuela. Beginning on Friday, April 27, the new iPad will be available in Colombia, Estonia, India, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, South Africa and Thailand.
The new iPad Wi-Fi models will be available in black or white for a suggested retail price of $499 (US) for the 16GB model, $599 (US) for the 32GB model and $699 (US) for the 64GB model. The iPad Wi-Fi + 4G models will be available for a suggested retail price of $629 (US) for the 16GB model, $729 (US) for the 32GB model and $829 (US) for the 64GB model.
The new iPad will be sold through the Apple Online Store (www.apple.com) and select Apple Authorized Resellers. Additionally, iPad 2 is available at a more affordable price starting at just $399.
America Movil Partners with Appia for the launch of ‘iApps’ (Latin America)
Wireless service provider America Movil, has announced the launch of its iApps Application Stores powered by Appia, bringing a vast catalog of apps and games to all America Movil subscribers across Latin America. According to company reports, the iApps Application Stores are now available through America Movil’s operating partners Claro, Comcel, and Telcel reaching over 240 million mobile subscribers in 18 countries across Latin America including Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico.
Marco Quatorze, Director of Value Added Services, America Movil, has said that with the launch of the Application Stores powered by Appia to all America Movil subscribers, Apps are now available to the majority of Latin American Mobile subscribers. Further, Appia’s carrier-grade solution enabled them to quickly roll out the largest Application Store across Latin America.
Appia’s Application Catalog includes thousands of applications and games for Android, BlackBerry, Symbian, and Java phones. The iApps Application Stores include both paid and free applications such as social media, news, weather and sports apps in Spanish, English and Portuguese. Leading application developers including Rovio and Gameloft are distributing their app through the iApps Application store, along with internationally recognized application developers including Facebook, Electronic Arts, and MocoSpace.
Lukasz Deszczulka, Executive VP Marketing, Tequila Mobile, has said that America Movil’s iApps Application Stores have been a great source of traffic for them. Also, the Latin American apps market is growing rapidly, and Appia and America Movil have made it incredibly easy to reach users and generate downloads.
Jud Bowman, CEO, Appia, has said that Appia is excited to partner with America Movil to bring apps to the hundreds of millions of mobile subscribers in North, Central and South America. As app use continues to grow globally, Latin American is a phenomenal opportunity for application distribution and we expect tremendous growth in app consumption.
Telefonica signs network sharing agreement with China Unicom (Spain, China)
Spanish telecom operator Telefonica has reportedly entered into a strategic partnership with China Unicom, wherein both operators will use each other’s networks to expand their coverage. According to reports, the deal will provide Telefonica access to China Unicom’s network in the regions of Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, Australia, France and Sweden.
In return, China Unicom can reportedly increase its presence through Telefonica’s network in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Panama, Peru, Venezuela, Mexico, USA, Puerto Rico, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria Denmark, Slovenia, Slovakia, Spain, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Morocco, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Netherlands, Czech Republic, Romania, Sweden and Switzerland.
Reports suggest that Telefonica believes this agreement will help both operators expand their capabilities to provide telecom services to various customers in different geographic areas.
Telefonica partners with Cellcrypt to launch encrypted Voice services (Latin America)
Cellcrypt, the leading provider of encrypted voice calling on mobile phones, today announced that it reached an agreement with Telefónica, one of the largest telecom operators in the world, to include Cellcrypt Mobile™ in their product and service portfolio across the 13 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean where Telefónica operates.
Cellcrypt Mobile is used by governments and corporations globally and is a downloadable application for off-the-shelf smartphones that provides end-to-end encryption of voice calls over cellular (2G, 3G), Wi-Fi and satellite networks. Cellcrypt Mobile is certified to U.S. government National Institute of Standards and Technology FIPS 140-2 security standard and has been awarded the CESG Claims Tested Mark (CCTM) from the U.K. government’s information assurance authority.
The announcement is part of an extensive partnership agreement that allows Telefónica to promote, sell and support Cellcrypt Mobile and associated technologies within certain countries.
As Governments and Corporations increasingly use cell phones for operational and administrative communications they have an increased need for government-grade protection from increasingly sophisticated unauthorized interception threats. This protection is required end-to-end so as to assure users that they control the security of calls along all points of the call path between caller and recipient, and have adequately mitigated risks in compliance with internal security policies.
Cellcrypt’s software provides end-to-end voice call encryption on smartphones making secure calling with high voice quality and low latency as easy as a normal cell phone call. Utilizing the IP data channel, secure calls can be made using both Telefónica’s cellular and Wi-Fi® networks from the same handset. As a software-only solution, deployment to personnel can take as little as 10 minutes anywhere in the world. Only Internet access is required.
“We are delighted to be able to offer our government and corporate customers an end-to-end encrypted voice calling capability with strong, accredited cryptography and requiring no physical hardware. This is important as our customers have a need for rapid and flexible deployment and redeployment,” said Raul Fraile, Deputy Director Business Development, Applications and Partner Relationships of Telefónica Latinoamérica, “and the ability to have interoperability between several different brands of popular smartphones is also very important to more broadly meet the diverse needs of our customers.“
“Cell phones are the most convenient, and often only, option for many operational and administrative communications across governments and business – just as they are in our personal lives,” said Richard Greco, CEO of Cellcrypt. “One problem with cell phone eavesdropping is that you rarely know it has happened. Rather than hope that the inevitable sensitive and confidential conversations that occur on cell phones are not compromised, this solution means that Telefónica customers can depend on their cell phones to be a secure and exploit their mobility, convenience, ease-of-use and interoperability as an important communications asset.”
Telefónica is one of the largest telecommunications companies in the world in terms of number of accesses and market capitalization. Its activities are centered mainly on the fixed and mobile telephony businesses with broadband as the key tool for the development of both. The company has a customer base of more than 290 million customers around the world. Telefónica has a strong presence in Europe and Latin America, where the company focuses an important part of its growth strategy. Telefónica is a 100% listed company, with more than 1.5 million direct shareholders.
For more information please visit: www.telefonica.com.
Telefonica Central America ends Q1 with 7.09 mn mobile subs
Telefonica had reported over 7.09 million customers in Central America at the end of March, rise by 10.3 percent year-on-year.
Mobile net additions in the first quarter of the year stood at 223,000 accesses, up by 37 percent year-on-year. The number of internet and data accesses plunged to 2,700 from 12,700 in March 2010.
The broadband user base dipped to 1,600, versus 11,400 in March 2010. Customers at mobile unit Movistar reached 6.6 million at end-March, rise from 6.4 million in December 2010 and 5.9 in March 2010.
Of the total, 5.9 million were prepay users and 631,400 were contract customers. First-quarter revenues in the region were flat at US$190.30 million, while OIBDA fell 16.5 percent year-on-year in local currency to US$54.97.
Across the Central America region, Telefonica offers services in Guatemala, El Salvador, Panama and Nicaragua.
Telefonica offers Myriad social networking services (Latin America)
Telefonica has introduced Myriad Social Network Services in Latin America.
The launch marks the first phase of Myriad’s five-year partnership with Telefonica to provide social networking to the Spanish giant’s 13 mobile operations across Latin America.
As part of the commercial launch, Movistar customers can access their social networks, viewing all their friends’ latest messages while updating their own status across all of their social network communities simultaneously via one mobile screen. Telefonica currently serves more than 140 million mobile users in Latin America, including Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela.
TechFaith expands motion gaming handset to LatAm
TechFaith Wireless will expand shipments of its motion gaming mobile phone into Latin America through a relationship with a US distributor.
TechFaith’s GSM motion gaming mobile phone features dual SIM card capabilities, MP3/MP4, and FM/AM radio. Consumers can also use the mobile phone as a fully functional, wireless motion game controller through a standard computer Bluetooth connection.
The first shipments will be to operators in Columbia, Guatemala and Nicaragua by May.
Millicom selects Huawei for international long- distance network deployment
Millicom has selected Huawei to deploy an international long-distance network in Central America. Using Huawei’s One Network solution, the new network will cover three countries: Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador.
Huawei’s One Network features precise calling control, flexible service dispatch, and simplified operation and maintenance, which will enable Millicom to introduce new types of long-distance services that open revenue streams and reinforce customer loyalty.
According to Zhang Shunmao, President of North Latin America, Huawei, with their unique strength and strong experience in deploying convergent networks, they are delighted to build a multi-country network that will increase operational efficiency and business profitability for Millicom.
As a substitute for the legacy long-distance switches in the existing networks, Millicom will deploy an All-IP-based multi-country gateway that will significantly simplify network architecture and bring an enhanced user experience to Millicom’s customers by improving voice quality and the reliability of cross-nation calls. The deployment of Huawei’s One Network solution will facilitate a smooth All-IP network transformation for Millicom by fully utilizing the existing network resources.
Guatemala Telecom market expected to reach $2.8 billion by 2015
The recent report by Pyramid Research reveals that the Guatemalan telecom market is expected to reach $2.8 billion by 2015 growing at a CAGR of 4.8%. The drivers behind this rapid expansion will be a 16-point advance in mobile penetration, as well as increases in data services and growth in pay-TV household penetration.
Guatemala is the largest market in Central America, and competition in the mobile segment has caused voice tariffs to drop to regional lows.
According to Jose Magana, analyst at Pyramid, despite this competitive scenario, Pyramid sees interesting opportunities in mobile data services where messaging, mobile Internet, and mobile broadband could close the gap in communications that fixed services could not. Mobile data revenue will expand at a CAGR of 11.8% over the next five years. Though messaging will remain the main source of revenue, connectivity will go from 6% to 28% in total revenues between 2010 and 2015. Also, mobile services, such as mobile banking and mobile advertising, could find fertile ground in Guatemala.
Magana noted that in the fixed line sector, the market will remain largely under-penetrated, and fixed broadband for the mass market has a chance to succeed. Also, initiatives, such as prepaid TV, prepaid broadband, and equipment bundling, are the right types of offerings for a market with this GDP per capita.
To keep up with the changing landscape, regional operator Claro has launched quadruple-play services to take advantage of the low penetration levels in broadband and pay-TV.
According to Mercado, Guatemala has witnessed important convergence moves, like bundled services offered by operators, as Claro and its Turbonett service attempt to become the first quadruple-play operator in the country. Pyramid expects both fixed-mobile convergence and triple-play bundles to have a significant impact in the foreseeable future.
Millicom plans new strategies to counter Bharti’s Africa entry
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: India’s Bharti Airtel Ltd.’s Africa entry with services such as money transfers, banking and insurance has been planned to be countered by Millicom International Cellular SA, a company with mobile-phone customers in countries from Guatemala to Tanzania by accelerating its growth process and bringing new innovations for the people.
Millicom operates under the brand name is Tigo and was established 20 years ago by Sweden’s Kinnevik Investment AB as a holding company for cellular assets.
Like Bharti, France Telecom SA, Vodafone Group Plc and America Movil SAB de CV, Millicon is also pushing third- generation services for wireless Internet besides broadening its portfolio that includes SMS-based information services and microloans for topping up prepaid balances. Millicom was also interested in some of Zain’s Africa assets that Bharti agreed to acquire for $10.7 billion in March. In the process to speed up growth, the operator is also planning to bid in Costa Rica.
Meanwhile, other Greenfield operations or mergers would also be considered if the company is capable of becoming first or second in their markets and producing at least $100 million in annual revenue.
According to Chief Executive Officer Mikael Grahne, sooner or later markets come to a certain level of maturity and to get growth from then on you need new products and services, so Millicom is very heavily focused on anticipating that and the company will pursue customers who can pay more for extras and better network quality, rather than competing strictly on price of basic services.
Analysts feel that Bharti’s entry into Africa is likely to spark a wave of consolidation as less profitable players exit the market and bigger one resort to extensive investment. Earlier, an investment of as much as 7 billion euros ($8.8 billion) in deals focused on Africa and the Middle East in the next five years has been announced by France Telecom CEO Stephane Richard while Vodafone CEO Vittorio Colao announced this month that sub-Saharan Africa is among the three priority areas†for the world’s largest mobile-phone company.
