May 2013

Google to challenge iPhone with Moto X

Google is preparing an attack on Apple’s iPhone with a device that is more aware of its surroundings and smart enough to anticipate how it will be used next, according to the head of the internet company’s Motorola subsidiary.

The gadget, called the Moto X, will be made in the US and will be part of a campaign to drive down the cost of smartphones and end the high profit margins companies such as Apple have enjoyed, said Dennis Woodside, the Google executive installed to run Motorola after it was acquired in late 2011. Sensors inside the device, such as a gyroscope and accelerometer, will be constantly powered up so the phone will know whether it’s in a car travelling at 60mph or being taken out of a user’s pocket, he said. Based on that, it will try to anticipate what a user is likely to want it for, for instance enabling it to open a camera app in advance to take a picture. Woodside hinted that the new handset would go on sale later this year and be priced well below the iPhone 5, adding that the sort of steep price declines seen in consumer electronics from personal computers to televisions were overdue in the smartphone market.

Europe trails US in next-generation wireless

The European telecoms sector is falling far behind the US in next-generation wireless services after years of investment shortfall, a development likely to hamper the continent’s competitiveness for years to come.

From roughly the same level of spending in 2007, investment in the wireless industry in the US has increased by more than two-thirds in the past five years, while comparable expenditure has decreased slightly overall across Europe, according to a scathing new report by GSMA, the mobile industry body. The difference in spending began growing at a time when new superfast 4G mobile data technologies became available, such that about a fifth of US mobile connections are expected to be using mobile broadband over 4G, or LTE, networks by the end of this year, compared with just 2 per cent in Europe. Tom Philips, head of government and public affairs at the GSMA, which produced the report with Navigant Economics, the consultancy, described the report’s findings as shocking for the European sector. “The [investment] gap looks like it is getting worse, not better. Europe is so regulated that it cannot afford to invest. Everything in Europe is subscale,” said Philips.

Can mobile roaming and network neutrality reform help save Europe?

Europe is in trouble. The Eurozone crisis, which is far from over, has laid bare the economic and even social divisions between north and south. Polling shows internal support for the EU is at an all-time low of just 41 percent. The European project needs a boost. Might lower mobile roaming charges and a net neutrality guarantee help save the day? It may sound absurd, but that is indeed the gist of a major speech given by Neelie Kroes, the EU’s digital chief. And Kroes wants to move fast: her team tells me the plan is for official proposals to be published “by September at the latest” before seeking approval from member states by October and the European Parliament by December. If successful, the proposals would be law by Easter next year.

A Deal That Could Benefit Mobile Users

[Commentary] A federal government committee has cleared the proposed acquisition of Sprint by SoftBank, a Japanese telecommunications company, after securing concessions from both of them that should address national security concerns about the deal. Though they still have to clear a few more hurdles, the deal’s approval by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States is encouraging news. SoftBank is offering to buy a 70 percent stake in Sprint for $12.1 billion and to invest a further $8 billion in the company. The deal, if approved by the Federal Communications Commission and Sprint’s shareholders, should make the telecommunications industry more competitive by providing consumers better and cheaper choices for phone and broadband connections. It should also help Sprint, which has long struggled financially, compete more effectively with the much larger companies that dominate the industry, AT&T and Verizon.

Dish Increases Its Bid for Clearwire

Dish Network has increased its bid for mobile-broadband operator Clearwire, topping the offer Sprint Nextel raised last week.

On May 22, Dish offered to acquire Clearwire for $4.40 a share in cash, a 29% premium over Sprint's offer of $3.40 a share. Clearwire shares jumped 19% to $4.15 after hours. The offer values Clearwire at about $6.3 billion. "The Clearwire spectrum portfolio has always been a key component to implementing our wireless plans of delivering a superior product and service offering to customers," said Dish Chairman Charlie Ergen in a statement. Clearwire shareholders are to vote on Sprint's takeover offer on May 31, but many of them have opposed the terms. Dish, which said it released its letter to Clearwire publicly due to the short notice, said it intends to commence a tender offer for the outstanding Clearwire shares before Friday's meeting. Dish said its offer is for all stockholders, but it's also willing to buy out only minority stockholders so long as it can acquire at least 25% of Clearwire's voting stock.

Study: TV and movie characters are smoking less but still drinking heavily

The tobacco industry really took a beating in 1998. The Master Settlement Agreement (MSA) they signed with state attorneys general required them to give states $206 billion in compensation for the Medicaid and other costs of treating sick smokers. But the agreement also banned them from engaging in product placement deals for TV or movies. R.J. Reynolds couldn’t pay to have George Clooney smoke Winstons anymore. You’d expect to see fewer cigarettes in movies after a deal like that. But the size of the decline may surprise you.

A new study in JAMA Pediatrics by Elaina Bergamini, Eugene Demidenko and James Sargent at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center and the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College finds that the MSA led to an exponential decline in the appearance of tobacco brands in movies. Bergamini et al added up all the tobacco brand appearances in the top 100 grossing movies each year from 1996 to 2009. They find that the appearances dropped by about 7 percent every year, and then plateaued in 2006 at around 22 appearances a year:

Carney: US 'will do all it must' to protect computer systems from hackers

Tom Donilon, the president's national security adviser, told Chinese officials in meetings this past week that the United States "will do all it must" to protect the country's critical computer systems from cyberattacks, White House press secretary Jay Carney said.

"He made clear that the United States will do all it must to protect our national networks, our critical infrastructure and our valuable public and private sector property," Carney said during the daily White House press briefing. Carney did not elaborate on what steps Donilon said the U.S. government would take to protect those critical networks.

Panel to review split ruling in Apple, Samsung patent fight

The International Trade Commission (ITC), a trade panel that specializes in patent cases, will reconsider a split decision made by one of its judges in a long-running patent battle between Samsung and Apple.

The ITC said it would take a second look at an ITC judge's decision that Samsung had infringed one Apple patent for a text-selection feature in its smartphones and tablets. It will also look at the judge's decision, made in March, that the South Korean company, which supplies some Apple chips, did not infringe a second patent which detects if a microphone or other device is plugged into its microphone jack. A final decision is due on August 1.

Average Fixed Broadband Speeds to Soar 350% By 2017

Here’s some good news if you happen to be a vendor that sells broadband gear to network operators and gets a nice shot in the arm with every upgrade cycle: Internet consumption is exploding and is showing no signs of dissipating.

The average, global fixed broadband speed will jump from 11.3 Mbps in 2012 to 39 Mbps in 2017 – a 3.5-fold increase -- Cisco predicted in its latest Visual Network Index (VNI) Forecast. In North America, Cisco’s predicting a slightly smaller jump -- from 13 Mbps in 2012, to 38 Mbps in 2017. Again, that’s just the global average speed and just one prediction among many presented by Cisco in its latest study of global broadband usage. Depending on the ISP and the region of the world, maximum burst speeds for residential broadband services, particularly in the downstream, are running anywhere from 100 Mbps to 1 Gbps.

Tell the FCC: Talk Radio Is Not 'Bonafide News!'

[Commentary] Is talk radio the same as "bonafide news"?

More than three-quarters of the American public say no, according to Pew Research, and one would think an agency sworn to protect the public interest and its airwaves would agree with that vast majority. But will Tom Wheeler, nominated to be the next chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, choose to put the public interest first, or will his FCC continue to simply turn a blind eye, as the agency has done since the Reagan administration?

Benton

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