In a typical reaction, analyst Iain Gillott of iGR good-naturedly called last week's price cut on Apple Inc.'s iPhone the "iShaft."Of course, that was before Apple quickly offered its fanboys a $100 credit to assuage the latter's sense of betrayal.Legions had purchased the device...
It must be tough to give a daylong presentation to financial and industry analysts in New York when your take-aways essentially are "meet the new team," "we can do it" and "stay tuned."The latter two messages are acquiring such a familiar ring that one...
An increasing number of parents around the country can sidestep the dreaded $400 cellphone bill boosted by their child's texting mania, as more wireless companies begin to offer custom controls on children's wireless usage.AT&T Mobility announced last week that it is making parental controls...
Carriers in the United Kingdom are hoping to get users to PayForIt with their phones.The operators launched a standardized payment scheme designed to provide a consistent user interface regardless of carrier for mobile transactions of roughly $20 or less. Users are identified via the...
Proving who you are-wirelesslyIraqi students are using a mobile social network service to prove their identity, according to Mobixie. The company said students have used the service to get new identifying documents after incidents where they were kidnapped by militia forces who confiscated their...
It's getting a little embarrassing. See, Apple is essentially trouncing the wireless industry with a long and growing list of new, user-friendly innovations. These innovations stretch from the hardware side of the equation (the iPhone's accelerometer) to the software side (the iPhone's visual voicemail).And...
The good news for the mobilephone industry is carriers, manufacturers, trade associations and standards bodies are nearly free of health litigation for the first time in years. The bad news is the industry is about to be confronted by an overlooked actor in long-running...
With music and imaging an increasing aspect of mobile phones' feature sets-the engines driving network operators' ARPU growth-more than 50% of this year's $32 billion in worldwide accessory revenue will come from multimedia-related memory cards, headsets and data connection kits, according to data from...
Delly Tamer, founder and CEO of online retailer LetsTalk.com, doesn't know if carriers' increased interest in bundling accessories presents a rival channel to his own, growing business, but he's pretty sure those carriers' customers eventually come to him."Bundling accessories with phones at the point-of-sale...
hedge*hog*ging v. Interrupting conversations in an office environment by poking your head over the top of the cube.The drastic drop in the price of the iPhone got us hedgehogging all week. It's evident an Apple/Verizon Wireless partnership never would have worked as Apple is...
Miles Flint, president of Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications, is stepping down Nov. 1 based on personal, family issues, sources said last week.The company said that the move was Flint's decision, but SEMC's carefully worded statements, Flint's successful tenure and near-simultaneous news that the vendor...
PLAYA VISTA, Calif.-A visit to the Electronic Arts Inc. campus in Playa Vista, Calif., is like walking into another land-a world where gaming trumps all, and the lap of luxury seems to beckon around every corner. Hoodies and beanies handily outnumber suits, a full-scale...
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin told Congress there are no grounds for alarm over the growing trend of private equity acquisitions of telecom and media companies, including a major carrier in the wireless sector."Private equity owners are covered by industry-wide consumer protection initiatives...
Two newly published stories could create more confusion rather than clarify controversies over whether cellphones pose risks to man and machine alike.Israeli scientists said radiofrequency radiation levels below those of mobile phones can cause biological effects in humans, but researchers stopped short of declaring...
The state and local public-safety interoperable communications market is expected to grow to $5.5 billion by 2012, according to government business analyst Input.That figure includes $3.4 billion from federal funding sources, said the firm. Input noted the National Telecommunications and Information Administration recently issued...
Regional wireless carrier Cellular South said it will roll out an m-commerce initiative early next year across all its markets following a successful three-month trial of mobile transaction technology.The carrier, which offers service in four southeastern states, partnered with Bank of America and others...
Leap Wireless International Inc. announced that its CFO Amin Khalifa has "resigned from the company to pursue other interests," and that Leap CEO and President Doug Hutcheson would assume his duties. Hutcheson was Leap's CFO prior to being named CEO. Khalifa joined Leap as...
Welcome to our Friday feature, Week in Review. Every Friday, RCR Wireless News will run through the major events of the past week, outlining what happened and speculating on what to look for in the coming weeks. Check below for news about carriers, handset...
Motorola Inc.'s new cellphone boss met Wall Street this morning, trying to be humble about the company's recent performance but confident about its future.Stu Reed acknowledged the company's missteps over the past 18 months: When the once red-hot Razr began to cool, Motorola didn't...
In a letter posted on the company's Web site, Apple's Steve Jobs offered essentially a $100 apology to the hundreds of thousands of users who purchased Apple's iPhone during the two months before the company slashed the price of the device.The letter is notable...
Wireless call quality continues to improve, with customers seeing a reduction in initial disconnects in particular, according to the most recent J.D. Power and Associates report on call quality.The study, which was based on responses from more than 25,000 wireless users earlier this year,...
L.M. Ericsson and Endemol International announced plans to develop an interactive TV and user-generated content platform designed to enable any mobile device user to upload, publish and share live or pre-recorded video.Me-On-TV is a network and device-independent technology that enables content originating from a...
Hello!And welcome to our Thursday column, Worst of the Week. There's a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for us at RCRNews.com to rant and rave about whatever rubs us the wrong way. We...
Hewlett-Packard Co. unleashed a wave of products yesterday, including two HSDPA-capable, iPAQ-branded smartphones running Microsoft Corp.'s Windows Mobile 6 Professional operating system.The offerings are notable as HP used to sell a range of iPAQ smartphones through various wireless carriers, but more recently has largely...
