savramesh

Source New Delhi: After HTC and Samsung, now Taiwanese electronics giant Acer has decided to throw its weight behind Google’s Android platform with the launch of Liquid. The company became the third brand to diversify its smartphone portfolio from Windows Mobile to the linux-based open operating system. Liquid is based on Qualcomm’s 1Ghz Snapdragon processor. “We like the platform because it is open and has an application store and a large number of developers working on it,” said Richard Tan, head of Acer’s handheld division in India. The shift in loyalties by Taiwanese mobile-phone makers is ominous for Microsoft, which practically invented the ‘smartphone’ category. It has steadily lost its market share under a sustained onslaught by Nokia-supported Symbian and Canadian smartphone maker Research In Motion (RIM), maker of the Blackberry series. Taiwanese manufacturers, particularly HTC, have traditionally been the ‘third front’ in the global smartphone industry. Being largely focused on hardware, they had tapped windows mobile to fulfil their software needs. However, with Windows Mobile market share dipping from more than 52% in 2006 to around 9% last year, most seemed to be jumping ships to the Google platform. HTC, which used to make more Windows Mobile phones than all other vendors put together, has already based around half of its new models launching this year on Android. Tan, however, said it would require more to make Acer take a drastic switch. “I would not say that we are shifting primarily to Android,” he said. “Because we have to first gauge the consumer reception for this product.” In line with global numbers, India currently has six Android phones, including two by the Korean giant Samsung which has the lion’s share of India’s touchscreen phone market, starting from around Rs 14,000 for the HTC Spica. Besides the ‘appstore’ made popular by Apple, companies are shifting to Android also because it is more squarely focused on the consumer market, says mobile aficionado and the editor of Cell Passion, Rajat Agarwal. “You could perhaps say that Windows Mobile has failed to grow beyond its enterprise roots,” says Rajat, pointing out that WinMo, as the platform is known in the circles, is perceived as too complex for average phone consumers to use. “The price of smartphones have dropped to such an extent that it has invaded the realm of the ‘consumer phone’ from being a primarily enterprise or geek device,” he points out. “However, it may be too early to write off WinMo, since they are coming up with a new, reworked version at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this month,” he pointed out. For consumers, Android on their phone means slightly longer battery life, a Google-supported store to download ‘funky’ applications from and state-of-the-art design and interface. Unlike WinMo, Android is opensource and therefore freely redistributable without paying royalties or license fees. More such models are expected to hit the market, including a blackberry-like device from Acer and new models from Asus, HTC and LG. Most are expected to unveil their new collection at the congress.

HC directive on mobile towers LUCKNOW: The High Court on Wednesday directed Noida authorities to unlock the seals of mobile towers after due inspection and if they are found to have been installed as per rules and norms. A number of mobile towers standing in residential areas were sealed by Noida Authorities on finding them illegal. The order was passed by a division bench of Justice Pradeep Kant and Justice Rithu Raj Awasthi on the petition of Indus Towers, an agency involved in installing mobile towers. It was contended that after following every rule and regulation, the petitioner had installed these towers. The court directed the petitioner to approach Noida authorities with all documents, which shall act within 24 hours. Mobile services in Noida were hit, especially in residential sectors 29-35 and industrial sectors 2-12, after the authorities had launched a crackdown on “illegal” mobile towers and sealed 193 out of 576 towers. A similar crackdown was started in Delhi as well and 40 towers were sealed.

done.. thanks..

they wasted too many papers to advertise their idea "save paper, save tree"...

Noida phones jammed with action against illegal towers With civic authorities sealing illegal mobile towers, telecom services in Noida which falls under Delhi telecom circle, have been severely affected. Things could become worse for mobile users in Delhi telecom circle if authorities in the Capital and that of Gurgaon, Faridabad and Ghaziabad decide to follow suit. Of the 600-odd mobile towers in Noida, around 250 have already been sealed, while authorities have started a survey to find out if any more illegal towers are there. This sudden action against illegal towers has left operators in a fix as subscribers in Noida are facing serious connectivity problem for the past four days. As per the guidelines, an operator has to take certain clearances before installing a tower, which includes structural safety clearances and no-objection certificate from resident welfare associations. Noida authority charges Rs.1-lakh fee per tower with all these clearances. And in case if a tower is installed before taking go ahead from civic authorities, Rs.1.5 lakh has to be deposited within a stipulated time along with all necessary clearances. According to a senior Noida official, it is here that the crux of the problem lies as mobile operators installed towers without taking clearances and now the authorities are sealing all illegal towers. On the other hand, mobile industry associations are crying foul, alleging that the civic authorities did not give them time or notices before taking action. To get immediate relief, they are even contemplating moving court to end the sealing drive. Even the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) was approached but operators failed to get any respite. However, Noida episode could be a tip of an iceberg as industry officials reveal that in Delhi as well as other townships, over 50 per cent towers operational today are illegal as they have come up without proper clearances. In Delhi alone, of 4,532 mobile towers, 2,517 are illegal, while the situation is equally bad. If action is initiated against all illegal towers, it would leave over 1-crore subscribers in the Delhi circle badly hit.

Videocon Hungama.. lol

calls will be charged only if get connected to CC or even while on IVR ??

if Quad band-multi channel, then why they have put different antennas for cdma and gsm ?

but some one please confirm if airtel started charing calls to CC.. i dont have an airtel to check..

just got the following tweet "Heard Airtel is now charging 50ps/3mins for calling customer care. Is that true?"

BSNL, MTNL ready to meet march 31 deadline for MNP State-run telecom companies Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL) will be ready to implement the mobile number portability (MNP) service by the new deadline of March 31. “There will be no delay from our side. We are very keen on this service as it will help us in garnering more subscribers,” BSNL Chairman and Managing Director Kuldeep Goel told Business Standard.He said the PSU is ready with its network on both services — GSM as well as CDMA. The company was waiting for clearance of equipment for setting up gateways from the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), which has now come through. “We will place orders for setting up gateways within a day or two,” Goel said. A senior MTNL official also said the company would be ready to implement MNP on schedule. “We will issue purchase orders shortly,” the official said. MNP would allow mobile users to change their service providers, while retaining their numbers. This new service is likely to improve the quality of services offered by various players. That’s because the introduction of MNP is expected to force mobile operators to both lure and retain subscribers by various incentives and schemes. After issuing purchase orders, it will take at least a month for the PSUs to get the networks ready. Testing will take another four weeks. Entire networks need to be tested among all the operators before the launch of the MNP service. MNP was earlier scheduled to start from December 31, last year in all the metros and in the rest of the country by March this year. But some of the mobile operators, including some new players, asked for more time to upgrade their networks. As a result, the government pushed the launch date to March 31 all across the country. Telecom regulator Trai has fixed Rs 19 as the charge to be paid by a subscriber to avail the MNP service. The whole process of shifting from one operator to another would take a maximum of four days. According to industry estimates, about 25 per cent of mobile users would like to shift to a new service provider. There are over 500 million mobile subscribers across the country. MNP has already been implemented in such countries as the US, Australia and Pakistan.

common friends lets forget it.. its over..

Done..

Techtree News Staff, Jun 25, 2009 1301 hrs IST Recent rumours suggest that the first batch has already been ordered ! Back in February, we had news regarding Nokia's intentions to enter the Netbook segment. Nokia CEO, Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo in a television interview had back then, subtly confirmed the news. Four months down the lane, when almost everyone has forgotten about Nokia's Netbook aspirations, we have fresh reports saying that the Finnish handset maker ordering its first batch of Netbooks from Quanta Computer Inc. and Compal Electronics Inc. This news also coincided with Nokia's recent announcement of its partnership with chip giant Intel in "creating an open standard for a new mobile computing platform built upon Linux-based operating systems". As of now, the news is that there will be one Netbook and another Smartbook from Nokia; the latter being powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon CPU. There has been no official word on its Netbook plans yet.

Source Mozilla, the company that owns the world’s second mot used web browser will soon be unleashing a new version of Firefox for the Nokia’s mobile platform Maemo. In a blog post Stuart Parmenter, Director of Mobile at Mozilla writes “To help bring in the New Year, Mozilla has released the first release candidate (RC1) of Firefox for Maemo.” He adds, “As always, we’ve provided unbranded Fennec desktop builds on Windows, Mac, and Linux. You can use these if you don’t have a Maemo device or to aid in add-on development.” The RC1 of Firefox for the Maemo is currently available for Nokia’s N900 and N810. Mozilla looks to augment the overall internet surfing experience with the RC1. The release comes with plug-ins, the iconic Awesome Bar and a tabbed browsing. In the new release Mozilla has also enhanced text rendering, added new hooks for add-on developers, and has also polished the application. Besides, the company has addressed many N900 specific issues, including installing to /opt and the fixing the symbol picker, says the blog post.

Firefox for mobile released Yes! The Fox has found another prey in the N900. The long awaited mobile version of Firefox, which had been code-named Fennec has been released. Unfortunately, for now the release is available only for the Maemo OS and will run on the N900, N820 and N800 Nokia devices. While the browser will finally be available for the Windows mobile platform as well (an alpha is available now) there are no plans for porting it to some of the other smartphone operating systems such as Symbian. Undoubtedly no version for Firefox for iPhone is planned, however a Blackberry port for Firefox is also difficult due to its Java-based OS. Android users however might see a Firefox version as such versions are undergoing testing and development. As Firefox enters the mobile market, it does not leave behind its powerful add-on centric roots. The Firefox mobile browser promises extensibility and in fact launches with the new Weave add-on which is Mozilla's official synchronization system for Firefox mobile and desktop. It is amazing how much of Firefox you get with Firefox mobile, the browser while meant for mobiles packs in almost all of Firefox's salient features. Even so the browser manages to provide an interface which is relevant for the current touchscreen mobiles. The Mobile interface for Firefox hides everything till you actually need to use it, saving all your space for the interface of the website that you are browsing. Most of the interface is hidden just outside the visible area and is accessible with a simple slide. By sliding the interface towards the right you get access to all the open tabs as thumbnails of the open windows. Sliding the page to the left will reveal on the right side, the back and forward history controls and a button a bookmark the page. An settings button is also visible on the panel at the right, which takes you to the interface for managing you browser settings and configuration. Here you can mange you installed add-ons and search for add-ons in the catalog. You can also manage your downloads here. For entering URLs, an address-bar is appended to the top of the page which is available when you scroll to the top of the page. Since the interface supports kinetic scrolling, you could easily reach these interface elements by the flick of a finger. Important features of Firefox such as the password manager and popup-blocker are available in the mobile version too, and missing ones can be added back with the help of add-ons. The add-ons gallery already has quite few add-ons which work with the mobile version, and more will be available soon. While plug-ins support is possible in Firefox Mobile, it has been disabled in the final version due to performance concerns. In Mozilla's tests, the Flash plugin performed fine for websites such as YouTube, however it was detrimental to a good browsing experience when using websites with multiple plug-ins. An add-on is in the works which will allow enabling plug-ins on a per website basis. Firefox's mobile standards support is at parity with Firefox 3.6, so yes even complicated HTML5 applications such as Google Wave will run on it. Support for features such as location aware browsing and off-line support means that websites such as Google search and Twitter can use you location data, and web application which support it can continue running even when you don't have network or internet coverage. So all you lucky N900 owners can now get the Firefox browsing experience on your phone. Just click here.

Nokia cuts phone prices as market growth returns Nokia cut phone prices across its portfolio in late January, putting its cheapest smartphones on a collision course with mid-range phones from rivals Samsung and Sony Ericsson. Nokia said price changes were part of its normal, ongoing business. The world's top cellphone maker usually cuts prices across its portfolio a few times each year. Several industry sources told Reuters Nokia had cut prices by up to 10 percent. After the price cut Nokia's cheapest smartphone model, the 5230, retails for around 170 euros (USD239) in Finland. The model's wholesale price is now below 120 euros. Demand for cheaper smartphones has helped the segment grow despite the recession, defying the broader, weaker industry trend. Sales jumped 30 percent in the October-December quarter according to research firm Strategy Analytics. Nokia said last week that revenue from smartphones jumped 26 percent in the quarter from the previous quarter to 3.9 billion euros, helping power its overall result. The average wholesale price of its smartphones dipped to 186 euros from 190 euros in the third quarter. The falling prices have hurt handset vendors like Sony Ericsson, who have focused on mid-range or feature phones, which often boast good cameras or music players but lack computer-like open operating systems. These have been cheaper than smartphones, but the price difference is declining fast. "This latest round of price adjustments sees Nokia taking its low-cost Symbian devices into new territory," said Ben Wood, research director at CCS Insight, a British firm that tracks the wholesale prices of mobile phones in Europe. Nokia's price cuts come as the industry returns to growth following a grim 2009 marked by recession-hit consumer demand. Nokia says it expects the cellphone market to grow 10 percent this year.

Nokia: Netbook entry Nokia, the dominant force in the handset industry, has spent the major part of 2009 guarding its turf against resurgent rivals like Samsung, LG, Sony Ericsson and Motorola, and also tech powerhouses like Research in Motion (RIM), Apple and HTC. Additionally, Nokia has also been deflecting blows at the operating system level, most notably from Google’s Android and Microsoft’s Windows Mobile. To be fair, Nokia has not exactly been a dormant observer all this while. This year, the Finnish handset major intends to counter its competitors, contain the market share erosion in the higher-end smart phone market and keep a check on persistent average selling price pressure in the lower-end segment, with a fresh category of mini-laptops. Nokia has decided to take its wireless capabilities to personal computers with the Nokia Booklet 3G. As Nokia announced its intentions to launch the Nokia 3G Netbook, the stock price rose 6 per cent on a single day. It would be reasonable to say that even though Nokia was caught out of sync by the launch and subsequent success of the Apple iPhone and the slew of new BlackBerry models from RIM, the company is set to show critics what it can do with Booklet 3G. Nokia is in the pole position as it becomes the first mobile phone manufacturer to launch a netbook, clearly marking a transformation in Nokia’s roadmap for the future. Nokia’s mobile phone share in the market keeps swinging between 35 and 40 per cent and overall smart phone share is somewhere static at around 40 per cent. According to analysts, this does not mean that the company is not growing, but it does indicate that the time was right to set up the focus on various other untouched areas, and Nokia Booklet has evolved from that. “PC users deserve more and the 3G Booklet gives them just that, by broadening the otherwise predictable PC market,” Nokia India Managing Director and Vice-president D Shivakumar had said in an earlier interview. While most netbooks (what small, light and inexpensive laptops are called) usually start at Rs 15,000, Nokia’s offering will cost roughly $800 (Rs 40,000). The company says this is because the Booklet 3G is more like a “mini-laptop” than a netbook, with its Atom 1.6GHz processor, 12-hour battery life, 10.1-inch HD display and Windows 7 operating system. Nokia has shown an increasing amount of interest in Linux, a competitor to the Windows operating system, and even announced that it will work with Intel on mobile devices that run the Linux-based Maemo platform. Even so, it did not choose Linux for its debut in personal computers. By choosing a Windows operating system, say market analysts, Nokia has ensured that its mini-notebook makes sense to consumers who have never really warmed to Linux netbooks. So will Nokia’s “mini-laptop” find a niche among consumers looking for powerful netbooks, regardless of price? Possibly, but not before Nokia battles another round of stiff competition from established computer manufacturers like Lenovo, Dell and Acer which are eager to increase their share of the market. And to succeed in an economy like India, Nokia has to also resolve the quagmire of pricing the Booklet 3G right. It can’t be too cheap because that will make smart phones such as the Nokia N97 look expensive, and it can’t be too expensive because that could alienate consumers who are aware of low-priced netbooks.

5

Source Virgin Mobile India Limited, a 50:50 joint venture between Tata Teleservices and the UK-based Virgin Group, plans to invest Rs 500 crore over the next six months on its mobile operations in the country. The cellular operator, which has a presence in six telecom circles as of now, aims to extend its presence to around 1000 towns in all the 22 telecom circles across the country within two years. “We would invest Rs 500 crore in the next six months on our mobile operations in the country. The investment will be made in areas like sales, brand promotion, distribution channels and customer care”, M A Madhusudan, chief executive officer, Virgin Mobile India told reporters here at the launch of the company's GSM mobile services. He refused to comment on the number of targeted subscribers stating that Tata Teleservices was providing the combined subscriber base of all its mobile services brands including Tata Indicom, Tata Docomo and Virgin Mobile. Virgin Mobile, a youth focused mobile operator, intends to capture 10 per cent market share in the urban youth segment in the country. Virgin Mobile has rolled out its GSM mobile services in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Orissa. Right from the day of launch, Virgin will have a presence in 27 towns of Orissa. The operator will have a network of around 6,000 outlets in the state which will cater to 65 per cent of the urban youth population. Customers, who sign up for Virgin Mobile, can make local and STD calls within the network at 20 paise per minute. The tariff for local calls to other network has been fixed at 40 paise per minute and that of STD calls at 50 paise per minute.

Purpose ?

ok ji...

2 networks through same antenna, does it work smoothly?

and they should include browsing too for 299 plan..

but is it worth reading long mails through sms ?? why cant they come up with good data plans.