Large-screen smartphones — often called phablets — have been getting a lot of attention lately. But so far, the devices make up only a tiny portion of the global mobile market, according to a new study. Flurry, a mobile analytics company,...
Read more »Are Phablets a Fad? Flurry Report Looks at Screen Size
Samsung Braces for Next Battleground With Google
Samsung made itself the brand to beat in the crowded smartphone space by backing Google’s Android software –- 96 percent of the South Korean company’s shipments ran on the platform. Now, it’s planning a high-end smartphone powered by Intel-backed open-source...
Read more »Forget the Batphone. Here Comes the Merkelphone
German Chancellor Angela Merkel is getting a new phone. In fact, she’s buying almost 10,000 of them, for something in the neighborhood of $31 million. This summer, the German government will get the first of about 9,600 hack-proof handsets. The...
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Photograph by Simon Dawson/Bloomberg
Gary Kovacs, CEO of Mozilla, with the Firefox logo during a news conference at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
Mozilla’s Fox Tries to Steal Spotlight and Outrun Google’s Android
While many European technology companies have pared back their presence at this week’s Mobile World Congress, Silicon Valley’s Mozilla is leaving a noticeably bigger footprint. The maker of the popular Firefox web browser sent about a hundred employees — which...
Read more »In Fast-Growing Mobile Ad Business, How Fast Is Fast Enough?
After Millennial Media reported this week a 71 percent surge in 2012 sales, the company’s CEO started calling top investors — to address their concerns. As much as the mobile-advertising company is growing, it’s not enough to meet its own...
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Photograph by Ethan Miller/Getty Images
A Toshiba Excite Android tablet is shown at the 2012 International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
Android Is Red Hot, Except With the Business Crowd
Google’s Android software for mobile devices has opened up a wide lead in market share, but it hasn’t made the same inroads with a lucrative niche: businesspeople. While Android is expected to grab 68 percent of the smartphone market this...
Read more »Jawbone Fitness Band Could Use Some UP-Dating: Rich Jaroslovsky
When I first reviewed Jawbone’s UP fitness wristband a year ago, I cautioned that it would soon come to seem remarkably rudimentary. A lot’s happened since. Problems with the band’s durability forced the company to stop production for most of...
Read more »Nook HD Hangs In as Tablet Wars Grow Hotter: Rich Jaroslovsky
In the tablet wars, Barnes & Noble is the scrappy underdog. Lacking the development resources, vast content stores and marketing muscle of deep-pocketed rivals like Apple and Amazon, it still somehow manages to remain competitive. The latest example is the...
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Photograph by Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg
Some of the most aggressive Android apps are programs purporting to be affiliated with popular franchises such as Facebook and Zynga, Bit9 found.
100,000 Android Apps Collect Too Much Data, Security Firm Finds
That Angry Birds wallpaper app you’ve downloaded is doing more than decorating your smartphone screen — in the background, it’s also accessing your device’s GPS data, which tracks your location. As unseemly as that sounds, it’s not uncommon. Security firm...
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Photograph by Peter Burrows/Bloomberg
At $329, only one in five iPad minis will be purchased instead of a larger iPad, said Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster.
Hand(s) On With the New iPad Mini
A few hours ago, I got the chance to play with the newest member of the Apple family — the iPad mini. My first impressions: It’s really light and really appealing, but it also feels a bit like a tweener....
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