Symbian's report on their business in the second quarter of 2008 makes some good reading. The Headline number of shipped Symbian OS units is an impressive 225.9 million units over 249 different models, and compared to Q2 2007, there's been an increase in sales for that period of 5%. Digging a little deeper, the royalty received peer unit has dropped from an average of $4.30 to $3.40, leading to an 18% drop in income from royalties.
Popular web broadcast service Qik, which allows users to stream live video from their handset to the internet, picked up a round of funding this morning from business partners Marc Andreessen (Ning) and Ben Horowitz (VP at HP). There's no word on how much was invested beyond the rather bland '[it's] significant.' Andreessen and Horowitz now join the board of the company.
It might be flagged up heavily as a mix of rumour and speculation, but Stuart Dredge's column over on Pocket Gamer makes a certain amount of sense. In it he puts forward the idea that Nokia will launch a 'Comes With Games' service, similar to 'Comes With Music' that we know is coming. The rumor was repeated by many at the recent Leipzig Game Developers Conference, with one major label allegedly signed up.
Until now, commercial software has generally been based around the traditional business model of selling a product directly to the user. Piracy is seen as a threat to direct sales, and many commercial publishers have responded to this with various kinds of DRM, but are there alternatives to the model which could make piracy irrelevant? Tzer2 takes a look at some candidates...
Nokia has extended the deadline for entries to its Mobile Games Innovation Challenge to the 8th of September. The contest is looking for innovative game concepts (actual code isn't required) for S60, Java or N-Gage, with the top 3 concepts getting money and contracts to actually create the games. The concept can take the form of text, mockup images and optionally video too. It's only open to professional development companies though, private individuals cannot enter.
In a further sign of consolidation in the wireless semiconductor industry Ericsson and STMicroelectronics have agreed to merge Ericsson Mobile Platforms and ST-NXP Wireless divisions respectively to create a 50/50 joint venture. The new venture should be in a better position to compete with Qualcomm and Texas Instruments and may help drive lower chip costs.
Canalys have crunched the numbers and produced some definitive smartphone sales stats for Q2 for EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa). Always interesting reading, the highlights this time are that 38% of devices had built-in GPS, 58% had built-in Wi-Fi and 13% had touch-screens. Nokia shipped almost 9 million smartphones in this region alone, with 71% market share - 7% is the share of RIM and HTC, more or less in joint second place. Apple are lumped in with others, but may prove a contender in the future, of course.
Digia has announced it has integrated TD-SCDMA to the S60 platform. TD-SCDMA is the version of 3G being used in China with networks covering 8 major cities and more to follow. The solution will enable manufacturers to reduce device development time as they will be able to use a ready-to-go software and hardware package (specifically a TD-SCDMA/EDGE modem from ST-NXP Wireless). This should help increase S60's market penetration in China.
In All About Symbian Insight #35 (AAS Podcast #88) Rafe, Steve and Ewan chat about the launch of the N-Gage's Reset Generation, carbon offsetting from your phone, the continuing importance of voice and the Nokia Music client/store.
Thanks to Russell for reminding me to open up AdMob's latest Metrics report (PDF link), revealing the top devices and OS used for browsing mobile web sites. Symbian OS has a big worldwide lead here, at 58%, with Windows Mobile and RIM tied on 13%. Apple's share is tiny, but then the iPhone's browser doesn't work well with mobile sites (I've tried).
In AAS podcast 86, a.ka. AAS Insight 33, Rafe and Ewan talk about N-Gage's Brothers in Arms and Reset Generation, Samsung's 8 megapixel Innov8 device, the challenges behind device comparisons and open source in relation to Symbian.
How successful is 'Mobile TV?' Will in the UK, it seems fair to label it as a 'statistical error.' The BBC are looking to resume trials of 'casting TV and radio to handsets, after their previous 12 month trial finished in April. The viewership peaked at 580 viewers in June last year, with an average usage of 13 minutes a month. They are now looking to syndicate their channels to the UK 3G networks, and are asking for the public's opinion.
It's another interview podcast, this time with Ewan speaking to Alfie Dennen from Moblog.net, which launched a new version of the popular platform late last week. We cover the history of the Moblog company, how to deal with upstart services such as Ovi(!) and what makes a service like this 'sticky' in podcast #85.
The BBC News website is reporting that Sony Ericsson is to cut two thousand jobs over the next year, in order to cut operating costs. The company was making a profit this time last year, but in the last quarter it reported a small loss.
Nokia today released its 2nd quarter results for 2008. Converged mobile device shipments (S60 phones) were 15.3 million (up from 13.9 million in Q2 2007) including more 10 million Nseries and just under 2 million Eseries devices. Net sales from the services and software division was EUR 119 million (up 42% from Q1 2008). Nokia increased its overall market share to 40%, up from 38% last year and 39% last quarter.
