Sprint inks another three years’ worth of iDEN infrastructure support with Motorola, ‘several’ new phones coming in Q1
Even as Sprint starts to dream up ways to sunset its aging (but still popular) iDEN network , reclaim the spectrum, and migrate its push-to-talk customer base to something CDMA-based, there's still a network to maintain in the short term -- and to that end, the company has re-upped its contract with Motorola to keep the system in tip-top shape for at least another three years. Amazingly, this will mean that the network is some twenty years old by the time the agreement is up in 2013, after which they'll either need to be ready with their CDMA replacement (bearing in mind that QChat already failed) -- or we imagine they'll need another contract renewal. Oh, and this won't just be a run-out-the-clock situation, either: there'll be at least some new hardware, with Sprint saying that "several" handsets are on tap for the first quarter of 2011 including the i886 ("stylish," rugged, and landscape QWERTY) and the i686, an update of the i680 with improved waterproofing
Categories: Mobile Phone, Other Tags: cdma, contract, customer, entry, i886, landscape, mobile, quarter, qwerty, result
TI’s OMAP4440 processor brings two blazing Cortex-A9 cores to the table
Phones and tablets based on TI's first production OMAP4 processor -- the OMAP4430 -- won't even be on the market until early next year, but TI's already planning ahead with the announcement of an upgraded chip that promises a 50 percent boost in overall performance. The new OMAP4440 can send its two Cortex-A9 -based cores as high as 1.5GHz, while the 4430 tops out at 1GHz; TI says that means we should expect a 1.25x improvement in graphics performance, a 30 percent decline in webpage load time, and 1080p playback performance that doubles the slowpoke (comparably speaking, anyway) 4430
Categories: Mobile Phone Tags: announcement, Cores, decline, dual-core, omap4430, quarter, result, texas-instruments, upgraded-chip, volume
Verizon adds fewer customers than AT&T in Q3, race for first place gets tight
By subscriber count, Verizon had vaulted into first place by a pretty comfortable margin following its Alltel acquisition , but AT&T added significantly more customers this last quarter than Big Red did -- and just like that, the battle for first place among the US national carriers is starting to get hot again. Verizon added 997,000 customers (excluding acquisitions) in the July through September period versus AT&T's beefy 2.6 million, meaning AT&T now stands at some 92.8 million -- just 400,000 or so fewer that Verizon's headcount
Categories: Mobile Phone Tags: count, entry, financial, first-place, period-versus, q32010, quarter, result, stands-at-some, verizon, verizon-wireless, vzw
Motorola Citrus budget candybar outed by Verizon, sports Android 2.1 and Blur
Motorola must've been real busy lately. Sharing the Verizon limelight with the Droid Pro today is this new entry-level Citrus candybar, which is actually the WX445 we saw exclusively back in July. Sadly, said handset will still be shipped with a slightly disappointing Android 2.1 OS and Blur skin, but hey, we did say it's entry level, right?
Categories: Android, Mobile Phone Tags: bfr, budgetphone, deets, engadget, motorola, motorola-citrus, phone, press, pvc, quarter, release, sports, verizon
Intermec CS40 walks the work / play tightrope, WinMo 6.5 threatens to knock it off
Even phone holster users (don't be shy, we love you) have every reason to shy away from using most of today's ultra-rugged business handsets from manufacturers like Symbol once they clock out for the day -- they're just too beastly, and typically, they trade every last ounce of ergonomic credibility in an effort to be as bulletproof as possible. That's a problem that Intermec is looking to tackle head-on with the new CS40, a phone that makes few reliability concessions while stepping down to a true smartphone form factor (and if you look closely, you can even see some hints of style in there). Just how rugged are we talking
Categories: Mobile Phone Tags: concessions, corners, flair, intermec, keypad-variants, mobile, phone, quarter, windows-phone, windowsembeddedhandheld, windowsphone7, winmo6.5
RIM posts impressive second quarter, expects even better third quarter
Coming off some negative press in the hands of the Torch , RIM would just like to remind everyone that it's still selling a crap ton of BlackBerrys...
Categories: BlackBerry, Mobile Phone, Other Tags: account, activations, black, blackberry6, hopes, negative-press, pockets, quarter, results, rim
Nokia’s VP talks N8, MeeGo ‘milestone product,’ tablets, Android and more!
Nokia's prepping for a fourth quarter launch of its MeeGo smartphone. The N8 will hit before the end of Q3.
Categories: Android, htc, Mobile Phone Tags: before-the-end, captivating, espoo, niklas-savander, nokia, nokia-booklet, nokiabooklet3g, nokian8, our-captivating, quarter
T-Mobile’s second quarter: revenue up, but customers still leaving
The good news for T-Mobile USA is that it seems to be moving upmarket thanks to a huge push into the smartphone space with devices like the HD2 and the myTouch 3G Slide -- enough of a push, in fact, so that it recorded slightly higher revenues in the second quarter of 2010 both year-over-year and against the first quarter ($5.36 billion in total). The bad news, though, is that it continues to lose customers -- roughly 93,000 this time around, 16,000 worse than the 77,000 it shed in the first three months of the year. Indeed, ARPUs were generally up over the first quarter, with data revenue up a whopping 18 percent against the second quarter of 2009; blended ARPU was down year-over-year, though, likely accounting at least in part for the $180 million decline in net income over the same period.
Categories: Mobile Phone Tags: arpu, decline, engadget, entry, mobile, months, mytouch3gslide, over-the-first, q2 2010, q210, q22010, quarter, result, still-leaving, usa
Telus launching North America’s first 42Mbps dual carrier HSPA+ network
Australia's Telstra already claimed the title of World's First on this one, but Telus up in Canada isn't far behind, becoming the first carrier in North America to push HSPA+ up to 42Mbps through the magic of dual carrier technology.
Categories: Mobile Phone Tags: australia, customers-some, hspa, hspa evolution, landline-modems, magic, modems, modems-at-first, network, north, north-america, press, quarter, release, result
Motorola Grasp reminds us company still does Android-free gear
It may not be the EX112 / EX115 they seem to be getting down in Brazil, but the Motorola Grasp isn't far off, proving that Motorola's still committed to delivering non-Android phones in market segments where...
Categories: Android, Mobile Phone Tags: 5mm, both-on-800, brazil, cdma, entry, market, moto, motorola, quarter, still-committed