Business Articles

With Android Lollipop usage finally below 25 percent, Android Oreo managed to climb above the 1 percent barrier for the first time in history. Android Nougat usage also grew up by more than 2 percent in February compared to the first month of this year.

LG's smartphone division has struggled of recent and the company has finally decided to cut its losses in the Chinese smartphone market.

Retro Computers Ltd. has offered a release date for its controversial handheld games console, the Sinclair ZX Spectrum Vega+. The crowdfunded console is based on the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, a popular personal home computer that was released in the UK in 1982.

Apple Inc. is still the world's best-selling tablet manufacturer according to recently released figures from IDC. Apple shipped more units in 2017 than both Samsung and Amazon put together.

The Chinese PC manufacturer Lenovo has issued a partial recall of its flagship ThinkPad today. The reason for this recall: A potentially loose screw, which might damage the battery.

Microsoft's results for Q2 2017/2018 show favourable increases in revenue and income. Cloud services are the standout performers with Office 365 and Azure as two of the main contributors.

The Samsung Galaxy S9 is set for a February 25 launch, and word on the grapevine claims it will be launched with an MSRP of $850, $100 more than its predecessor.

Reports by Strategy Analytics and IDC have provided data that gives a clearer idea of the state of the global smartphone market over 2017. Samsung rests cozily at the top, Apple follows steadily, and Xiaomi sees incredible growth.

Inspired by initial coin offerings (ICOs), UNICEF figured out that cryptocurrencies could facilitate fundraisers for humanitarian scopes. The latest Game Chaingers program is targeting the help of gamers who own beefy GPUs that can mine decent amounts of Ethereum directly into the UNICEF electronic wallet.

DigiTimes claims that component suppliers are getting increased orders from Apple and that new iOS and MacBook devices are slated for debut starting March 2018.

Valve CEO, Gabe Newell, has responded in the negative to recent rumors about a possible acquisition of Valve by Microsoft. Others such as Electronic Arts are yet to confirm or deny the reports.

During the presentation of Sony's Q3 2017 financial ressults, they announced the resignation of their current President and CEO, Kazuo Hirai, to be replaced by Kenichiro Yoshida. Hirai's time at the top was defined by a return to profitability for Sony, and he will remain with Sony Corporation as Chairman.

StatCounter's new analytics show Windows 10 overtaking Windows 7 as the Windows OS with the highest desktop market share up till January 2018. Although other analytics firms paint the opposite picture, the numbers are still strong nevertheless.

The company Turing Robotics Industries has filed for bankruptcy in Finland. The company was supposed to start the production of Turing Phones in a factory formerly used by Nokia but wasn’t successful in doing so.

Samsung could be bringing some competition into the ASIC crytocurrency miner market as it is looking to produce its own ASICs. The company is also looking to align its fabrication development with TSMC and hopes to complete the 4nm process by end of 2020.

BTC dropped to almost US$8,000 as alarming news put the stability of all cryptocoins in a tight spot.

The Honor 7X, one of our best value picks of 2017, is now being manufactured locally in India, at a Flex manufacturing plant in Chennai.

Microsoft has listed out a few servicing changes to Windows and Office keeping in view the deployment requirements of the enterprise. The company also detailed availability and support cadences of Office 2019 and Windows 10 LTSC.

OnePlus has released a report that points towards a significant growth in its sales numbers, with smartphone shipments seeing a 55% year-on-year growth and revenue said to have doubled.

The popular messaging app Telegram and variant Telegram X have vanished from Apple's App Store due to 'inappropriate content', although founder Pavel Durov claims that the apps are gone because of a minor issue and should resurface soon.

Apple confirmed that the US Government has asked questions regarding intentional throttling of old iPhones and reaffirmed that it would not degrade the customer experience to force upgrades.

Hackers are trying to spread the stolen NEM coins to as much as 20 accounts, but Coincheck and the NEM Foundation have already tagged all the affected coins, making the affected cryptocurrency easily trackable on exchanges.

In less than a year, Nintendo managed to sell more Switch consoles than their lifetime sales of the Wii U. With almost 15 million units sold in 2017 compared to the 13.5 million of the Wii U, the hybrid Switch console is already considered to be a major success.

Fujifilm will own a 50.1 stake in a joint venture that would combine Xerox and the existing Fuji Xerox, of which Fujifilm already controls 75 percent. The Connecticut-based Xerox will change its name to Fuji Xerox, and about 10,000 jobs will be cut by 2022.

Despite its tough looks and proofing, the FZ-G1 features some surprisingly outdated hardware for a 2018 device. The price also seems "extremely" suitable for this device ready to take on harsh conditions.

The updated roster includes two Portégé and four Tecra models. The Portégé models feature premium options like Thunderbolt 3 connections, while the Tecra notebooks are more affordable, but integrate bigger displays.

Rumors are doing the rounds that Microsoft is looking at a possible acquisition of a large game publisher, such as Electronic Arts, Valve, PUBG Corp., or the likes. But there is also skepticism given Microsoft's not-so-successful track record of turning acquisitions into profits.

The new SZ985 Z-SSD drive is the most effective solution for log data processing and high-speed caching, targeting the enterprise customers in need of top performance and reliability for AI, big data, and IoT applications.

Microsoft has decided to purchase PlayFab, a company that provides services for building, launching, and growing cloud-connected games. PlayFab's extensive list of clients includes names like Rovio, Atari, and Disney.

A study by Chinese analytic firm Jiguang has provided data that throws some light on the demographical userbase of Xiaomi and Huawei smartphones in China.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Intel had informed select customers about the Meltdown/Spectre vulnerabilities. What's news, however, is that somehow the Chinese Government could have gotten to know about the vulnerabilities much before the US Government did.

Mexico has just become the second country in Latin America to get Samsung Pay, after Brazil. The local launch partners include Banorte, Citibanamex, HSBC, Santander, Clip, iZettle, and others.

Due to the lack of workers, Samsung decided to shut down one of its two manufacturing plants they have in Slovakia. However, this is pretty good news, since earlier reports claimed that the company was considering the possibility to shut down both of them.

Hackers managed to steal 523 million NEM coins and possibly US$123 worth of Ripple coins from Coincheck's online hot wallet. The Japanese exchange assured its affected customers that the money will be reimbursed upon the completion of the police investigations.

Although the amount of Google Play app downloads in Q4 2017 is more than double the number achieved by Apple's App Store, the tables turn when talking about the revenue they generated. In this area, Apple leads by about 95 percent.

An APK teardown of the Settings APK in Note 8 Oreo builds reveals a new biometric authentication called 'Intelligent Scan' that could probably feature in the upcoming Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus. The APK teardown further reveals that the new dual-camera setup in the S9 Plus could enable depth-sensing stickers that can be added to photographs.

The new PowerVR Series8XT GT8540 GPU uses Imagination Technologies' Furian architecture and provides an 80 percent fill rate gain over its predecessor. Even more, it can feed up to six 4K displays at 60 fps simultaneously.

Austrian retailer, Gameware.at, is unhappy about Microsoft offering Xbox Game Pass subscribers access to the latest games on day 1 for a low monthly price. The retailer has decided to delist all Xbox consoles from their online store citing low profits.

MSI is planning to release new cards based on the AMD Radeon RX 570 and RX 580 GPUs. Not much is known about the new cards apart from the fact that they come with a new color scheme and improvements to the cooling system.

Although the Chinese market recorded a few quarterly drops in the past, 2017 was the first year ever to end with a negative smartphone shipments growth.

The recently announced Dell Chromebook 5000 series will hit the market next month with the Chromebook 5190 as the debut device. This Chrome OS-powered notebook for education sports a rugged design and is expected to start at US$289.

KGI Securities revealed some more information about what can be expected of iPhones in 2018. Alongside the details, the report also implied that the iPhone X will be discontinued than be discounted due to low sales. Apple watchers, however, say this is highly unlikely.

Qualcomm is facing a EU€997 million (US$1.2 billion) fine from the European Union for anti-competitive practices based around a five year contract (2011 - 2016) with Apple which imposed a financial penalty if Apple sourced 4G LTE modems from any of Qualcomm's competitors. Qualcomm is also being investigated for intentionally selling modems below cost price in order to force a competitor out of the market between 2009 and 2011.

Samsung is mulling to sell its Exynos SoCs to other smartphone vendors in a bid to boost its foundry utilization and increase its market share in the mid-range segment.

Fitbit, which acquired the Pebble brand in 2016, has announced that they will support the Pebble smartwatch line until June 20th, 2018. In other words, support for Pebble services and devices will end on June 30th of this year, marking the end of an era.

After being in charge as Twitter's COO for about a year, Anthony Noto decided to move on, accepting the CEO position at SoFi, a financial technology startup.

Going by the huge orders placed by Apple for LCD modules for a new 13-inch MacBook, it appears that the Cupertino giant might soon retire the iconic MacBook Air as it does seem out of place with the new MacBook range.

Apple's wireless HomePod speaker is finally launching on February 9 for US$349 with pre-orders starting tomorrow in the US, UK, and Australia. The HomePod features an enhanced Siri experience, spatial awareness, and a wide soundstage.