Not Another Mobile Phone Blog

Dee Dutta, who had resigned few months back from the post of Corporate Vice President & Global Head of Marketing & Corporate Vice President at Sony Ericsson Mobile, is now the Founding Partner at Business Value Creation Ltd. The Marketing Guru has moved to management consulting and will now help companies to take better Strategic and Commercial decisions. Best of luck Dee for your new venture.

These are the countries, where the new 3G iPhone will be launched on August 22nd 2008.

[Via: EngadgetMobile]

According to Gartner’s latest report on the mobile handset industry, mobile shipments will reach 1.28 billion units by the end of 2008. This number stood at 1.15 billion in 2007. Though there is a growth of 11%, I think the rate would have been higher if there was no economic slowdown. If you see this year many big mobile handset players have suffered. Sony Ericsson is not doing well and though Nokia is the market leader, its position is facing tough competition from players like Samsung and LG especially in the emerging markets.
Coming back to Gartner, the research firm has identified major trends that will have an impact on the mobile handset industry in 2009. These trends include stuff like, Consolidation of Vendors, New Players Jumping into the fiercely competitive mobile handset market, mobile handset makers focusing on making users life simple, vendors focusing on building new eco-system, mobile devices becoming lifestyle statements (thanks to phones like Samsung-Armani and LG-Prada) and vendors focusing on support, upgrades and enhancement of devices.

[Via: Telecom Tiger via Gartner]

Nokia Tube’s Spy Shots and Specs leaked sometime back. Here are some pics of the Nokia Tube UI from JUSTAMP.

I am damn sure that, all you James bond fans out there including me are waiting for the new Bond flick, “Quantum of Solace”. The last James Bond movie starring Daniel Craig, Casino Royale, had the Silver Sony Ericsson K800i Cyber-Shot being used by the British Spy. The phone has been showcased as a true companion of Bond during his spying activities. Now as the new Bond Flick is about to be released in November 2008, Sony Ericsson will be launching the Limited Edition Titanium Silver Sony Ericsson C902 Cyber-Shot that will be used by James bond in Quantum of Solace. As it is a Limited Edition it will be available for a short period of time and will have a lot of cool James Bond-007 content pre-loaded in it.

The phone will be used by Bond through-out the movie and has the name suggests, this piece of spy-gadget has a 5 mega pixel snapper with slide-out lens, illuminated touch icons (if you are spying in night), face detection, auto focus, photo flash and a host of other essential camera functions. The phone has a technology called, BestPic, which lets you take 9 pictures of a moving object simultaneously and then you can go back and choose the best shot. This one’s a true imaging monster. Apart from this the phone has Picture blogging for uploading photos to blog sites and PictBridge for printing direct to a printer and you don’t need a notebook or PC for that. [The image that, I have used is not the Limited Edition C902, it is the normal C902 in Black color.]

A device with Flexible Display is not something that is part of the distant future. This Nokia 9900 Concept is a mobile phone that deploys flexible screen. At first glance it may look like an ordinary pen but the phone sports a flexible touch screen that can be pulled out when in use and when not in use, the device can be used as a mobile phone. The device can take pictures and can be controlled by the button on top.

As per reports from the Daily Mail UK, Apple is all set to launch the Nano version of their immensely popular iPhone in Christmas. There is no official confirmation on this from Apple and also if this nano iPhone will be 3G or not. The Nano iPhone will be launched in UK with the help of O2. The kind of description they have given seems unrealistic. A insider to Daily Mail UK has said that the Nano iPhone will have touch wheel on the back and display on the front, are you kidding me?? The image above is just the imagination of some mobile geek like me, it does not mean or say that the iPhone Nano (if it ever launches) will look like this, viewers discreetion is advised ;-)

Here is what that was posted in the week that was,

3G iPhone coming to 20 countries in August
Moto RAZR2 V9 Ferrari Edition comes to India
Nokia 6205 Dark Knight Edition
3G iPhone coming to India on August 18 2008
BlackBerry Thunder coming in October 2008
LG mobile phones to have Dolby's Mobile Technology
Nokia Growth Partners' Investment plans
Nokia announces price cut of 10% on selective mobile phones
DoT announces 3G licensing plans
Nokia's New Navigator on Indian shores

Nokia 6210, the Navigator mobile phone from Nokia has been launched in India. Navigation and location-based services have started catching pace in India with Nokia taking a lead as a mobile phone company. Nokia is also promoting the use of mobile map functionality among Indian mobile phone users with the help of its advertising strategy. Anyways, the Nokia 6210 Navigator is a slider S60 device with built-in GPS and Nokia Maps functionality. The QUAD Band GSM phone has big 2.4 inch QVGA display that makes it easy to view maps, 3.2 mega pixel snapper, flash and video playback functionality. When it comes to processing power the phone ha s 369MHz processor, 128 MB internal memory and memory slot for expansion. With built-in GPS and Nokia Maps functionality the phone joins the league of GPS phone from Nokia like the E90 and Nokia N95 8 GB that are doing well in the Indian market. The phone is priced at 17,000 INR in India and will be available in red and black color.

India’s much awaited 3G policy, which was due few weeks back has been finally announced. This 3G policy will bring smile on the face of foreign players as they can participate in the 3G auction like their Indian counterparts. The minister of Communications and Technology has announced that the 3G license will be sodl through a system of global auction. According to details given by the ministry, first 3 to 5 licenses would be allocated and then 5 more licenses will be allocated. However, one important point to note in this announcement was that, 2 licenses would be reserved for BSNL and MTNL and both these companies would get this licenses immediately.

According to Cellular-News, “The Department of Telecommunications has also fixed the reserve price for the licenses at Rs 160 crore (US$37.6 million) for metros and category A circles, Rs 80 crore (US$18.8 million) for category B, and Rs 30 crore (US$7 million) for C circles. The reserve price for a pan-India license is Rs 2,020 crore (US$475 million).”
BSNL has announced that it is planning to launch 3G services in next 6 months and as you know AirTel is ready with its 3G applications and partners.

RIM’s iPhone killer, the BlackBerry 9500 Thunder will be thundering in the month of October. Earlier, the Thunder was supposed to come in the month of September. Few days back some more details were revealed about the Thunder, like its QWERTY and SureType Keypads, Music Interface, Landscape and Portrait mode etc. These details have made the Thunder to be one of the most awaited phones this year. BlackBerry phones till now focused on the business user but with Thunder they are making it clear that multimedia capabilities in a business phone is the need of the hour. The Thunder sports a 480x320 fully-functional touch screen, a 3.2 mega pixel snapper and also a microSD slot for memory expansion. Apart from this, the good news for music lovers is that, the Thunder will have Rhapsody Music service for users to download music on the go.

[Image Via: Blackberry Sync]

The new iPhone 3G would be making its debut in India on August 18th 2008. Vodafone is the one who is going to bring this much awaited piece of gadgetery to India. The price of the iPhone bundled with a Vodafone SIM will be around 13,000 INR for a 8GB model. But I though next round of iPhone launches are slated for August 22nd, then is this true, lets see for that.

Nokia has come up with the new Nokia 6205 slider phone. This one is special because it’s the Dark Knight Edition. Nokia is riding the wave of Dark Knight’s popularity. Though the Nokia phone that, was shown in the Dark Knight movie was not the much awaited Nokia Tube, this Dark Knight Edition is 100% made for the Dark Knights within you. The phone has a 2 inch internal and 1.28 inch external display that makes it look pretty cool along with its Black color. The phone has high-speed EV-DO Internet connectivity.

Nokia 6205 Dark Knight Edition Specifications -
* 1.3-megapixel camera with flash and 4x digital zoom
* 58 MB internal memory; expandable up to an additional 4GB with an optional microSD memory card
* Support for text, picture and video messaging
* Get It Now-capable for downloading games, ringtones, wallpapers and other mobile content
* VZ Navigator-compatible for audible turn-by-turn directions and location information
* Mobile Web for access to the latest news, sports, weather and more
* Voice dialing and voice commands for touch-free phone operation
* Built-in speakerphone
* Bluetooth-enabled for wireless headset support

After Vertu and Sony Ericson launched the Ferrari versions of their Ascent and K800i mobile phones, it’s time for Motorola. The ailing US mobile giant has launched the Special Ferrari Edition of Motorola V9 RAZR2 phone in India. The phone has Ferrari branded screensavers, wallpapers and ringtones. Other features include music downloads, internet browsing, 3G capability, 2 mega pixel snapper with 8X zoom, stereo Bluetooth, video streaming, capture and playback. Being a Ferrari Edition it has the fast connecting 3G technology and EDGE/GPRS1 Class 10 & 12. The phone has dedicated MOTOMUSIC from where users can access the MOTOMUSIC portal and download high quality music and other digital content. The phone is prices in India at INR 21,000 and will come with 2GB memory card and accessories like leather case and stereo headset.

Tim Cook, Apple COO has confirmed that there is no shortage of Apple’s new 3G iPhone and the company is all set to carry its second round of launches in 20 countries on August 22nd 2008. India is one of these 22 countries as iPhone will be coming to India in August and will be launched by Vodafone followed by AirTel. Both, AirTel and Vodafone have opened up pre-registrations for the new 3G iPhone and their plans have also been made official by many newspapers in India. When I called up Vodafone’s call center they just confirmed that the iPhone is coming sometime in August but they didn’t throw any light on the pricing and plans the company is planning to implement, same is the case with AirTel, so till there is more insider information on this we have to wait.

Here is that, what was posted in the week that was,

King Khan, Aamir and Jr. B in Forbes

Finally the pictures of the much hyped iPhone Killer, the Nokia Tube have leaked on the Internet. The Tube, according to me doesn’t look like much of a iPhone killer from the pics, I mean its touch screen interface does not look that impressive as compared to the iPhone. But the specs below look good and might prove as a deciding factor for many, who are planning to buy this new iPhone killer.

Nokia Tube Specifications –

* Measurements: 111 × 52 × 14.5 mm, and weighs only 104 grams.
* 16 million color TFT LCD
* 640 × 360 pixel resolution
* 16:9 display mode
* Fifth edition of Symbian S60
* finger touch operation will provide vibration feedback function.
* 3.2 megapixel Carl Zeiss optical lens with autofocus
* Dual LED flash
* Built-in GPS
* 140 MB RAM
* GSM / GPRS / EDGE / WCDMA / HSDPA / WLAN wireless networking and Bluetooth technology.
* 3.5 mm Headset interface
* TV-out interface
* BL-5J 1150mah Battery

[Original Story Via: Digi Tech QQ]

Sony Ericsson comes out with pretty good accessories for their mobile phones. When they launched the W810i, long time back, the company came up with optional external speakers for this mobile phone. The external speakers were pretty good for a small room, I mean the bass. treble plus the sound quality was pretty fine. If you remember sometime back, Sony Ericsson came up with the wireless and round Bluetooth enabled speakers, MBS 100, which did pretty well in the market. After almost one year, Sony Ericsson has now come up with the enhanced versions of the MBS100. The MBS 200 is a single wireless speaker to which you can stream music with a Bluetooth connection. For power users there is the MBS 400, which has two speakers. The speakers automatically mute if you are getting an incoming call…pretty cool huh!!!