The mobile world is abuzz with new launches and mouthwatering announcements from Samsung Groups’s news Galaxy S5 smartphone to Nokia X series budget phones. Here?s a look:
* Samsung S5: Samsung Group?s new Galaxy
Samsung announced its much-awaited Galaxy S5 and the Gear devices (new smartwatch and fitness band) at the MWC. The Samsung Galaxy S5 has a heart rate monitor and so does the Gear 2 smartwatch, which runs on the Tizen OS. The Gear Fit has a curved touch-sensitive screen and its features include a pedometer. Samsung will launch its new devices on April 11, 2014, in 150 countries.
* Back to BlackBerry
BlackBerry Z10, which was launched last February in India with a price tag of Rs 43,490, is now available at Rs 17,990. You read that right. This is the second time the Canadian smartphone maker has cut the price of Z10 since its launch. In September the price was slashed to Rs 29,990. That?s not all. Blackberry pulled the wraps off of its new Q20 handset at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona. Billed as the ?Blackberry Classic? by company CEO John Chen, the device will feature a full QWERTY keyboard along with fresh Blackberry 10 software. The smartphone maker also unveiled a 5-inch, all touch Z3, once code named the Jakarta. The lower-end Z3 smartphone, priced at under $200, is being built under a partnership deal with FIH Mobile, the Hong Kong-listed unit of Taiwanese electronics company Foxconn Technology Co Ltd.
* Brush with Bluetooth
Deutsche Telekom CEO Timotheus Hottges showed off a smartphone-linked toothbrush at the MWC. The toothbrush, to be sold under Proctor & Gamble?s Oral-B brand, has a Bluetooth 4.0 link to an app that can be programmed to give
personalised advice to help people improve their brushing.
Facebook?s acquisition fatigue
After snapping up WhatsApp for $19 billion, Facebook founder and chief Mark Zuckerberg said he will stay off acquisitions for some time.
Zuckerberg said, ?After buying a company for $19 billion, you are probably done for a while.? But he added that the buyout was ?worth more than $19 billion?.
* Nokia X
Mobile devices cheap enough to reach emerging markets without sacrificing so much performance that first-time smartphone owners will give up on the Internet and forgo a second smartphone down the road. It’s a delicate balance.
When Motorola Mobility introduced the low-cost Moto G smartphone last fall, the company emphasized how it was bringing the features of high-end smartphones to a device that starts at just $179. Even then, it had to sacrifice camera resolution and connectivity to the faster 4G LTE cellular networks. And $179 is still expensive for many.
At the Barcelona show this week, Nokia Corp. unveiled the Nokia X series, starting at 89 euros ($122).
