News From Symbian Smart Phones World...

Nokia Reports First Quarter 2010: Profit Falls 40%, Pressure On CEO Growing

22 Jul 2010 11:48:51 GMT

As expected, The Finnish mobile phone giant reported today a sharp drop in second-quarter profits, further increasing the pressure on embattled Chief Executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo.

Kallasvuo, who has spent more than half of this life at the company, may be ousted already this month, the Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week.

Nokia reported that second quarter Devices & Services net sales increased 3% to EUR 6.8 billion, compared with EUR 6.6 billion in the second quarter 2009. At constant currency, Devices & Services net sales would have decreased 2% yea... .. .

Texas Instruments Brings First WLAN Adaptation Package To The Symbian Platform

22 Jul 2010 08:12:18 GMT

As long-time proponents and committed enablers of the open source community, TI supports the Symbian Foundation's vision of a proven, open and comprehensive mobile software platform. Their recent collaborative efforts resulted in Symbian's very first WLAN adaptation package - a contribution critical to the success of Symbian's goal for the one-click connectivity outlined in the Symbian^3 platform scope.

For the Symbian Foundation, the WLAN adaptation package represents another major milestone in fostering one of the largest open source transitions in the industry. For TI, this package represents the introduction of the TI WiLink™ 6.0 WLAN driver (running on WL1271) as a key component of Symbi... .. .

Technology: ARM And TSMC To Bring Faster, Better And More Efficient Mobile Processors

22 Jul 2010 06:24:05 GMT

ARM and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Ltd. today jointly announced a long-term agreement that provides TSMC with access to a broad range of ARM processors and enables the development of ARM physical IP across TSMC technology nodes.

This agreement supports the companies' mutual customers to achieve optimized Systems-On-Chip (SoC) based on ARM processors and covers a wide range of process nodes extending down to 20nm.

The agreement provides TSMC access to optimize the implementation of ARM processors on TSMC process technologies, including ARM Cortex processor family and CoreLi... .. .

How Your Symbian S60 Smartphone Can Help You Feel and Look Like A Pro Cyclist

21 Jul 2010 08:19:49 GMT

Do you currently cycle for fun or as a hobby, but want to go to the pro level? If you want to get there, or you've decided to take your bicycling seriously you must be willing to put in the time, energy, and the training.

However, you must also acquire the necessary pro cycling equipment. When you look at the pros at an event such as the Tour de France, they have the best of the best for equipment so that they can adapt to the weather conditions, terrain, as well as the length of the race.

Whether your goal is to win a bicycle race or bike all daywhile touring, there are least six ways your Symbian powered smartphone can help. You can plan the route, track your activity, get cadence from the built-in accelerometer and enjoy in some ni... .. .

Symbian Developer Cooperative Launches And Joins The Symbian Foundation

20 Jul 2010 06:35:49 GMT

The Symbian Foundation today welcomes its newest member, the Symbian Developer Cooperative (Symbian DevCo), a non-profit, independent organisation founded to raise the profile of individuals within the Symbian community and give them a full voice in the governance of the Symbian platform.

Participants in Symbian DevCo, known as Associates, enjoy the same rights and benefits as employees of other member companies. Symbian DevCo launched today, along with its web site at symbiandevco.org.

The organisation is open to all individuals and participation is free of charge. The Symbian Developer Cooperative will provide a focal point for passionate individuals within the Symb... .. .

Investors Lose Patience: Nokia Conducting Search For A New CEO To Replace Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo!??

20 Jul 2010 06:23:36 GMT

With 40% global market share, the Finnish company remains the world's largest cellphone marker, but has struggled to keep pace in the smartphone market against well entrenched rivals such as Microsoft and Research In Motion and especially against newcomers such as Apple Inc.'s iPhone and numerous phones based around Google Inc's Android platform, not to mention Palm which is here since the beginning and keeping the pressure on too.

In a response to this growing competition within the mobile business, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal that cites "people familiar with the situation" Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo may be in his last days as CEO of Nokia Corp. as he struggles to find traction for the company in the market for high-end smartpho... .. .

Symbian and Nitobi Simplify Cross-Platform Development

19 Jul 2010 19:38:31 GMT

Symbian Foundation, the non-profit organization responsible for the world’s leading open source smartphone platform and Nitobi, creators of the ground-breaking PhoneGap mobile application development framework, today announced an open source collaboration designed to simplify mobile application development.

By integrating Symbian’s web application creation tools and Nitobi’s PhoneGap 'write once, run anywhere' platform, mobile developers can now easily make app store ready applications for all major mobile platforms.

The companies will be showcasing this capability for the first time at OSCON, the open source convention, at booth number #700. In addition, Nitobi has contributed PhoneGap to Symbian, which is included in the in the Symbian^3 plat... .. .

Firmware v10.0.021 For Nokia C6 Now Available Through Nokia Software Updater!

19 Jul 2010 19:17:05 GMT

Good folks from over at Nokia's software department are very pretty productive nowadays as we got lot of software updates lately and Good folks from over at Nokia's software department are trully very busy and productive nowadays not just because of finalizing Symbian S^4 User Interface but also because of the lot of new firmware updates that company has rolled out lately and I'm sure there are many more to come.

Anyway, the last one is the new software version for the Nokia C6, affrodable smartphone that combining the benefits of a 3.2 inch touch screen with a full slide out keyboard. Firmware version v10 is now available through the Nokia Software Updater for most of the generic product codes from EMEA region and AP... .. .

VIDEO: Sony Ericsson Vivaz Family To Get A Pink Sister Soon!

19 Jul 2010 18:45:04 GMT

According to official Sony Ericson blog, the Vivaz family will soon get the Light Pink variant which is expected to be available in selected markets end of this quarter.

Sony Ericsson Vivaz is company's second phone in the new family of communication entertainment phones that feature the new design philosophy 'human curvature', first introduced with the Xperia X10, which will become a consistent feature of Sony Ericsson’s portfolio going forward.

Designed to mirror the shape of the human body, and at the same time delivering a precise and compelling phone interaction, Sony Ericsson Vivaz is instantly recognisable. Cre... .. .

NetQin Mobile Releases Mobile Guard v2.4 For S60 3rd and 5th Ed Devices

19 Jul 2010 10:50:29 GMT

NetQin Mobile Inc., a global leading mobile security service provider, has just released NetQin Mobile Guard, a free mobile application, for S60 the 3rd and 5th devices. Featuring a package of system optimization, web management, and proactive defence tools, the application provides users with total control over the amount of internet traffic and improves the system's overall speed.

NetQin Mobile Guard v2.4 is designed to optimize system performance while minimizing the power consumption, and keeping users in control of the amount of internet usage.

The product also features mobile optimization scans to allow users to have their phones running at optimum speed. This includes an Operating System Scan that scans for bas... .. .

Nokia Kinetic: A Seriously Magical and Playful Concept Phone

19 Jul 2010 10:19:33 GMT

Well I am really not sure what it is so appealing about these shiny concept phones that appear from time to time but I'm sure most of you agree with me that it is really pleasure to look at, although we know it's hard to expect that such phone will land in the shops anytime soon.

Anyway, to meet our future vision, Jeremy Innes-Hopkins, a creative designer from London who is currently studying product design at Central Saint Martins worked with Nokia to make a conceptual kinetic phone to show where mobile phone trends are heading in near future!?

Nokia Kinetic is a magical mobile phone that makes receiving a call, text or email more playful, by convening digital information into kinetic movement. Spontaneous, magical and undire... .. .

First Screenshots Of The New But Not Greatly Improved Symbian S^4 Homescreen Interface

19 Jul 2010 10:16:42 GMT

Couple of months after Nokia has submitted a proposal for a new framework for Symbian-powered UIs to the Foundation's open community, we finally got the first screenshots of the new but not greatly improved Symbian S^4 homescreen application, mainly thanks to the folks from Symbian Developer Wiki.

Screenshots show a nice array of eye candy and some actually useful bits, like minimalistic status bar with a quite small, battery, reception indicator and clock in the middle.

Also it seems that home screen now support continuous wallpapers implemented on pretty much the same way as to the Nokia N900 and to make the switching between this m... .. .

Weekend Reading: GPS Technology In Smart Phones Is Set To Explode During The Coming Years

18 Jul 2010 09:17:44 GMT

With cell phones increasingly becoming the nexus of the burgeoning markets for navigation and Location Based Services (LBS), the use of Global Positioning System (GPS) technology in such platforms is set to explode during the coming years, according to iSuppli Corp.

In the fourth quarter of 2011, 79.9 percent of cell phones shipped—amounting to 318.3 million units—will incorporate GPS functionality, up from 56.1 percent in the first quarter of 2009—or 187.8 million units—iSuppli predicts.

"The smart phone is the key product driving the technology industry today—and social networking services and applications spurred by GPS-related features are critical elemi... .. .

Dev Tip: Public Beta of Nokia Signing Symbian Apps for Free

17 Jul 2010 18:59:26 GMT

To assure end users that the data on their mobile devices is protected, it’s essential to properly package and sign your applications whenever possible but with the wide range of choices for developers, the question becomes: Which packaging and signing solution is the right one for your application?!

In an attempt to make it easier to publish apps in Ovi Store, Nokia recently simplified the tools and the process, and removed some of the cost associated with developing mobile apps for distribution in Ovi Store.

Developers must make initial investments to create Symbian apps; for example, obtaining a Publisher ID and paying a third party to have the application Symbian signed. Currently, thi... .. .

Weekend Reading: Apple's Attempt To Draw Entire Smartphone Industry Into Its Self-Made Debacle Is Unacceptable

17 Jul 2010 07:33:02 GMT

Just to be clear, I'm not someone who is ardently anti-Apple, not at all, I just can't resist to that Apple CEO Steve Jobs is considered one of the greatest marketers in history which means that nothing he claims can be trusted without checking twice and it's hard not to be angered and frustrated knowing that Mr. Jobs usually only telling the half-truth at best.

Anyway, Nokia has just released an official statement about their antenna design and their engineering philosophy in direct response to Apple's Friday press conference on antenna issues and said that their engineering devoted thousands of hours to study how people hold their phones in order to prevent the so called dea... .. .

Sony Ericsson Reports Second Quarter 2010 Results

16 Jul 2010 08:46:30 GMT

Struggling mobile device maker Sony Ericsson, today reported a net profit for the first quarter, boosted by product launches as well as company cost savings.

As of June 30, 2010 Sony Ericsson retained a net cash position of Euro 609 million, an increase of Euro 46 million sequentially mainly due to operating results, tight financial management of working capital, as well as positive currency effects. Market share in unit base for the quarter remained flat and is estimated to be around 4%. Sony Ericsson maintains a forecast of slight growth in units in the global handset market in 2010.

Bert Nordberg, President, Sony Ericsson commented, “Our second quarter results show that the company continued the momentum seen in the first quarter as a result of our foc... .. .

Mobile Phone Service Subscriptions Reached 5 Billion Last Week

16 Jul 2010 08:26:14 GMT

This week marked yet another milestone in the internet becoming mobile when the 5 billionth mobile subscription added to the count, largely thanks to emerging markets like India and China.

According to Ericsson estimates based on industry information, the 5 billionth subscription was added Thursday, July 8. In the year 2000, about 720 million people had mobile subscriptions, less than the amount of users China alone has today.

Mobile broadband subscriptions are growing at similar pace and are expected to amount to more than 3.4 billion by 2015 (from 360 million in 2009). Studies show that soon 80 percent of all people accessing the internet will be doing so using their mo... .. .

SQRXZ: Mindblasting Jump 'n' Run Puzzle Game For 3rd Ed, 5th Ed and UIQ 3 Devices

16 Jul 2010 06:44:23 GMT

SQRXZ is a nice platformer with puzzle elements. Hop around, collect stars, stomp on enemies, avoid traps and reach the exit in each level. The game offers 15 levels of oldschool platform fun reminiscent of the classic Amiga era.

SQRXZ (2010) is a remake of a game with the same name and has been created by Rodolphe Boixel (Thor), Shahzad Sahaib (Kojote), Simon Butler and Brendan Ratliff (Syphus). Minor support came from Marcus Vesterlund himself who also gave permission to redo his game.

A remake should be usually bearing improvements, so does Sqrxz 2010. Beside the “classic” graphic mode, there is a new mode with “deluxe” graphics. The main gameplay has modified in a way that you need to collect all items to open the doo... .. .

Nokia C6-01 Accidentally Appeared On Official Nokia's Netherlands Website

16 Jul 2010 05:55:25 GMT

OMG, I can smell a kick here ;o) poor webmaster of the Nokia's Netherlands website has managed to accidentally reveal official photos and specifications of yet unannounced Cseries devices and make it available for public access a bit earlier than expected!?

Leak is definitely not according to Nokia plans, so in case you understand Dutch better hurry up if you interesting in, I'm pretty sure Nokia will remove it as soon as possible.

Anyway, Nokia C6-01 looks pretty much the same as its younger brother, the Nokia C6-00 that combining the benefits of a 3.2 inch touch screen with a full slide out keyboard but this variant is equipped with quite better eight megapixel cam... .. .

Minor Firmware Update For Nokia E75 Now Available As FOTA And NSU Update!

16 Jul 2010 05:16:28 GMT

I know, I know, I'm a little bit late on this one, but you know what they say: "It's better late than never", so just in case you didn't read it elsewhere already I would like to let you know that Nokia has rolled out minor firmware updates for their latest full QWERTY Eseries device!

New firmware version for Nokia E75 is now available as FOTA update and through Nokia Software Updater as well for most of the generic product codes from EMEA and APAC region and is expected to be available for the rest of the world (NAM and branded devices) shortly.

According to pretty short bulletin of the changes issued by Nokia, software version 211.12 brings just a minor phone and app performance improvements including; e-mail cli... .. .

OVI Store Continues To Improve But Significant Challenges Remain

15 Jul 2010 23:18:26 GMT

Nokia's Ovi Store was launched a little over one year ago, May 26th 2009. Almost immediately the company issued a statement apologizing to users who were unable to access the service due to "...extraordinarily high spikes of traffic..."

Since then there have been substantial improvements and the store no longer suffers from the kinds of outages reported just after its launch. And volume has continued to scale with downloads passing 1.7 million daily in April.

Developers recognize the improvements over the past year and more than 80% said they would be sticking with Nokia and Ovi with the expectation that their experience would continue to improve. But having 20% of Nokia's "top" develo... .. .

Opera Mobile 10.1 Beta For Symbian S60 Phones Is Out Now

15 Jul 2010 18:24:42 GMT

Opera Software today unveiled the new beta (10) of Opera Mobile web browser for Nokia and other Symbian/S60 handsets.

With new features such as accelerated speed and geolocation capabilities. The Opera Mobile 10.1 beta also contains the latest version of the powerful Presto rendering engine, Vega graphics library and their own Carakan JavaScript engine.

In addition to the new engines and geolocation, this beta also has updated kinetic scrolling, virtual keyboard and auto-rotation to landscape making your browsing exp... .. .

Nokia Opening Its Java Runtime Under Terms Of Symbian Foundation's Eclipse Public License

15 Jul 2010 11:02:14 GMT

If you here for a long enough than you already well aware that I am not huge fan of java applications, or to be precise MIDlets. Apart from the stone-age user interface and general slowness, the most annoying issue are endless, annoying and worthless security prompts!

Ironically most of the phone users don't even understand what the heck the prompts are saying and confirms all of them without thinking twice whether they really know it's safe to do so or not.

However, it's also important to say that Java is deployed on more than 2 billion devices. It is s the most wide-spread mobile runtime in the world ensuring the best market reach for developers and widest selection of mobile services and solu... .. .

China Plans To Approve Nokia's Online Mapping Services

15 Jul 2010 08:51:31 GMT

China plans to give mobile phone giant Nokia a licence to offer online mapping services, making it the first foreign firm to be approved since new rules were unveiled in June, an official said Wednesday.

Ovi Maps covers more than 180 countries with car and pedestrian navigation for 74 countries, in 46 languages, and traffic information for more than 10 countries. There are more than 6000 3D landmarks for 200 cities around the world.

The official at the State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping told AFP that Nokia's application to operate its Ovi Map service would be given the green light, though final approval wa... .. .

Fishlabs's Rally Master Pro Now Available For Free On SE's Satio And Vivaz!

15 Jul 2010 07:53:29 GMT

It is one thing to stuff a lot of nice hardware into a mobile phone (PowerVR SGX equipped Symbian smartphones) but it is quite another story to make all this power available to the developer and attract them to make the games which take the most advantage of the hardware!

Sony Ericsson did an amazing job here and gave all necessary support and tools to Fishlabs's engineers to port their Rally Master Pro from iPhone to Symbian featuring almost the same functionality on Satio (only automatic acceleration when using touch controls due to single touch on Satio and no multiple simultaneous sounds due to lack of layered sound capabilities).

According to Fishlabs CEO, Michael Schade, the new and updated version available for Sony's high-end Symbian phones is 'the best version' of the racer, with 'better than PSP qua... .. .

Smaato: Android Gains In CTR But Symbian Still Dominates!

15 Jul 2010 06:29:24 GMT

The Smaato Metrics for June show further significant increases by Android in global click through rates (CTR), while leaders Symbian and Feature Phones both suffer a dip in CTR Index.

Smaato serves over 8 billion ad requests in its network of more than 6,000 registered mobile publishers and over 40 mobile ad networks.

In the US, Smaato's metrics reveal that while Symbian still dominates the region in terms of CTR (and despite small market share of handsets), Android has closed the gap with a CTR Index of 192 (118 in May), while Apple iOS drops down to fif... .. .

Minor Firmware Update For Nokia 5230 Now Available As FOTA And NSU Update!

14 Jul 2010 22:10:52 GMT

Just want to give everyone a quick heads up that latest firmware update (v21.0.004) for Nokia 523, company's cheap and affordable full-touchscreen Smartphone is now regularly available for most of the generic Euro codes as 'Over The Air' update and as usually, it should be progressively available at the Nokia service points and through the NSU as well.

The new firmware is meant to provide further performance improvements and new functionalities to the handset, and it is already available for most of the generic European and Asian product codes.

There is no detailed change log at the moment and I can't see any noticeable changes or improvements but as you would imagine, the firmware update is always recomm... .. .

VIDEO: Nokia's Terminal Mode Technology Demoed On Nokia N97 And Volkswagen's Passat CC

14 Jul 2010 21:48:45 GMT

Couple of week ago, Nokia and CE4A (Consumer Electronics for Automotive) working group have released the Terminal Mode technology specification as a proposed industry standard for the integration of mobile applications into the car environment and now thanks to god folks over at Engadget we got the first glimpse of Terminal Mode in action!

At MobileBeat 2010, Volkswagen's engineers showed off the video which shows VW Passat CC’s head unit connected to Nokia N97 which is completly controllable through larger touchscreen on the head unit.

Unfortunately, according to Engadget and VW’s engineers this technology is still a couple of years away from commercial integration into vehicles so don’t expect to see it as an additional equipment for the latest generation of VW Pas... .. .

Hard Truth: Of Smartphone Owners, Only A Third Will Consider Getting A Nokia

14 Jul 2010 07:01:16 GMT

According to the latest wave of YouGov's Smartphone Mobile Internet Experience study YouGov study, the Finnish mobile telecommunications giant is now lagging even further behind its competitors than six months ago. Of smartphone owners, only a third will consider getting a Nokia as their next handset, compared to 46% in December 2009.

On top of that, only ten percent of smartphone owners expect to purchase a Nokia, a drop of nine percent over the last six months.

In contrast, Apple continues to hold onto the lion's share of the market, with 56% of smartphone owners considering and 41% expecting to get an Apple handset next time roun... .. .

AuthenTec, leading provider of security, identity management and touch control solutions Joined The Foundation

14 Jul 2010 06:44:15 GMT

AuthenTec, a leading provider of security, identity management and touch control solutions, today announced that it has joined the Symbian Foundation, which, together with its ecosystem, is creating the most proven, open and complete mobile software platform.

The source code for the Symbian platform is available to all under the Eclipse Public License.

“The Symbian Foundation welcomes AuthenTec into the community," said Lauren Sarno, Member Programs Manager at Symbian. “Our semiconductor members are at the heart of such important functionality as long battery life and to... .. .