iPhone 3G most used handset in the USA
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The USA is celebrating third generation with iPhone 3G becoming the most used mobile phone in the country.
Ruling over 4 percent of an “embedded base of all subscribers” of US market from January to October, the bestselling device of Apple tops the list of several other competing handsets such as RIM’s BlackBerry and mobile phones made by LG, Motorola, and Samsung.
iPhone 3G’s accumulative sale is just past the BlackBerry 8300 series which has 3.7 percent of the market share, followed by the RAZR V3 series with 2.3 percent and the LG enV2 with 2.1 percent.
iPhone game maker Tapulous sale attain $1 million per month
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Sales of Tapulous, a Mobile software developer and the name behind the super hit iPhone game series Tap Tap revenge, reached $1 million per month. This provides the perfect evidence of Apple’s App Store’s ability to help some developers to earn a very handsome living.
With more than 600 million total games played, 99-cent Tap Tap Revenge now tops the 20 million download benchmark. Tapulous revenue is generated via advertising and in-app music purchases and the developer has so far raised $2.8 million from investors including venture capital firm Khosla Ventures and Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff.
Vodafone seeks to improve its network quality in UK
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The turnround of head of Vodafone’s under-performing UK business has been staked on the quality of its mobile network. According to a company official, Vodafone’s network can easily cope with the bandwidth-hungry smartphones, led by Apple’s iPhone.
However the largest mobile phone operator of UK, O2 has landed into serious trouble with its London network since the summer. Data applications running on smartphones has been periodically crushing the infrastructure.
In 2006, Vodafone conceded the rank of largest UK operator to Telef³nica’s O 2, which strengthened its grip on the market by signing a deal to be the exclusive British network for the popular iPhone in 2007.
However the company has announced that it would start selling iPhone from January 14, and its tariffs scurried consumer hopes of a price war. According to the head of Vodafone Guy Laurence, iPhone is not a price war but a quality of network war. During the downturn Vodafone has not been cutting capital spending unlike Telefonica.
Vodafone to launch its iPhone on January 14, 2010
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: A New Year gift awaits the people of UK as Vodafone is ready to launch its iPhone on January 14, 2010. 24-month contract will cost £30 per month to the customers. A flat fee of £59 for the 8-GB iPhone 3GS, £149 for the 16-GB 3GS, or £239 for the 32-GB 3GS will also has to be paid by the customers.
Besides, various tariffs plans are also offered including unlimited SMS and WiFi access, and 1 GB of data. A range of tariffs for small business customers are also offered by the operators.
The handset will be sold online through its network of 400 stores and through Apple retail outlets, and also through its indirect partners, which include Carphone Warehouse and Phones 4U.
iPhones get the Bing App
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Voice-enabled queries and automatic “Locate Me” functionality as well as driving and walking directions, touch-based map panning and zooming, and image results. All these luxuries will be at your feet if you
own an Apple’s iPhone and iPod touch.
Microsoft announced the introduction of a free Bing mobile search application for the two handsets which will also have features like movie showtimes, news and flight status.
In June, mobile web edition of Bing (the successor to its Live Search solution) was launched by Microsoft. Bing extended to touchscreen-based devices for web-enabled Windows Mobile, Sidekick and BlackBerry devices in early November. Earlier this month, Microsoft debuted a new application optimized for its Windows Mobile platform.
Android taking over smartphone market in the USA
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Google’s Android’s popularity is taking over the market of smartphones with 17 percent of the users in the USA considering the purchase of an android-supported device in next three months. iPhone
continues to set the bar with its App Store and passionate user base with 20 percent of the users indicating their plans to purchase an iPhone.
While Android is gaining momentum among developers and consumers, RIM remains the leader among the business set. Android’s share of the smartphone market has doubled by 3.5 percent.
Apple and Android-supported devices were more likely to engage with mobile media than an average smartphone user. 94 percent of Apple iPhone users, 92 percent of Android device users, predominantly T-Mobile G1 users engaged in mobile media activities in September 2009, which is 12 percent more than smartphones users.
87 percent of the iPhone users engage in e-mail as compared to 63 percent of the Android users. Otherwise, Apple and Android users are likely to engage with news via their browser and nearly identical in their mobile application engagement.
Legal battle spiced up between Apple and Nokia
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: According to the latest development in the legal battle between USA’s Apple and Finland’s Nokia, Apple has countersued Nokia over 13 alleged patent violations of its technology. The move is followed by a lawsuit filed by Nokia in the month of October, accusing iPhone maker Apple of ten patent infringements.
The US based company has said that its competitors have to compete with them by inventing their own technologies and not by just stealing it from Apple.
Earlier, Nokia had said that it has not yet been compensated for its technology. The ten alleged patent infringements by Apple involve wireless data, speech coding, security and encryption applied to all models of the iPhone since its launch in 2007.
According to Nokia, it had agreements with about 40 firms allowing them to use the firm’s technology, but Apple had not signed an agreement.
China Unicom’s iPhone sale reaches 100,000 mark
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Mired by sluggish start after its launch on October 30, the sale of Apple Inc. iPhones seems to have picked up in China with 100,000 set already been sold by China Unicom.
However, China is still very far as compared to the USA where Apple sold 270,000 iPhones in the first 30 hours after it first went on sale there in 2007, while China Unicom had sold only 5,000 iPhones till the fourth day of its launch.
High price of these iPhones is a major factor that is holding back its sale in China. $730 to $1,020 has been charged by Apple and Unicom and even Wi-Fi Internet function is disabled on Unicom’s iPhones to comply with Chinese government rules.
Last month, China Unicom had said it aimed to increase the number of its third-generation mobile users by more than 1 million a month. At the end of October, it had just over 1 million 3G users.
