Sony Ericsson to do first Windows phone
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As part of an effort to boost its presence in North America, the handset maker is planning a family of Windows Mobile devices, starting with a business-oriented device due this summer.
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Sony Ericsson on Sunday announced a new premium handset aimed at capturing the Web convergence market, blending multimedia with mobile Web communication in its first product using Microsoft Corp.'s operating system.
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Palm has announced its first non-touchscreen smartphone for Windows Mobile 6. Beginning in October, the Treo 500v will be available to Vodafone customers in Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, the UK, and South Africa.
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Sony Ericsson   and  Microsoft  will cooperate in making smartphones, with  the first Sony Ericsson handset based on the Windows Mobile  operating system on sale by the end of the year.
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(InfoWorld) - Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications will get its GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) mobile phones made in India by contract manufacturers, starting with entry-level color phones and mid-level phones with music. Annual production of its phones in the country is to reach 10 million by 2009, Sony Ericsson said on Wednesday. The phones will be made by the local operations of Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., which uses the brand name Foxconn, and Flextronics. These companies already make phones for Sony Ericsson in other locations. About two-thirds of Sony Ericsson's phone production worldwide is met by contract manufacturers, Miles Flint, president of Sony Ericsson told reporters in Chennai. Flextronics will start producing Sony Ericsson phones in the second quarter, with Foxconn beginning manufacturing about two to three months later. Sony Ericsson joins a number of mobile manufacturers,Â including Nokia, that are manufacturing in India or contracting Indian manufacturers, to meet the countryâs booming demand for mobile phones. India's largest telecommunications service provider, state-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam, insists on local manufacture of equipment it procures. Making the phones in India will help Sony Ericsson reduce costs, and offer handsets at a lower price, the company said. The phones will offer customized features for the Indian market, such as local content and customized keypads. India isÂ adding over 6 million mobile phone subscribersÂ each month. The number of wireless subscribers grew 97 percent from 75.94 million at the end of December 2005 to 149.5 million subscribers at the end of last December, according to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India in Delhi.
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PARIS On Tuesday, PalmSource, the maker of the Palm operating system for hand-held devices, is scheduled to announce its first operating system designed specifically for smart phones, mobile phones that allow you to not only make voice calls but also use
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Sort of Owners of Sony Ericsson smartphones released last year now have some hope of seeing some bugs fixed.â¦
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Sharp and the Japanese division of Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications will jointly develop mobile phone handsets based on the Symbian operating system (for NTT DoCoMo&#39;s third-generation (3G) Foma service in Japan and software for Foma phones.
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In a deal aimed at rivaling Appleâs iTunes and Nokiaâs Ovi, Sony Ericsson will offer more than five million music tracks on it PlayNow Internet and mobile phone service.
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(InfoWorld) - Responding to demand for ultra-thin designs, Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications has announced a new Walkman music phone -- its slimmest handset yet. The product is one of several announced Tuesday ahead of the 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona next week. The W880 packs music features into its 9.4 millimeter-thin mobile phone design: the handset comes preloaded with Walkman Player 2.0, Disc2Phone music management and TrackID music recognition applications. A 1GB Memory Stick Micro (M2) card, capable of storing up to 900 tunes, is included in the box. The handset also features a 1.8-inch QVGA, 262k TFT (thin-film transistors) display, a 2 megapixel camera and the Bluetooth Music Receiver MBR-100 system. This discreet accessory uses short-range wireless technology to stream music from the user's phone directly to a home or car stereo, using the phone as a remote control to alter the volume or skip through tracks. In addition, the phone provides a flight mode for use on airplanes and is equipped with a battery capable of playing music up to 20 hours or offering 6.5 hours of talk time. The W880 music phone is based on the GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) standard and supports both the GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) and 3G (third-generation) technologies. It offers a range of communication services, such as a push e-mail, Web surfing and video streaming. Sony Ericsson will also provide a GSM variant of the Walkman music phone, the W88, without video telephony capability, for the Chinese market. A slightly larger Walkman phone, minus a few features, is the W610. The W880 music phone will be available in selected markets in the first quarter, with the W610 to follow in the second quarter. Prices were not available. Among the other new products is a series of low-end, easy-to-use handsets, which Sony Ericsson calls "candy bar" phones. The K200 phone has a camera and a central navigation key to give one-click access to key features. The K220, another camera phone, has an integrated FM radio, which can store up to 10 stations. The J110 and J120 phones, which lack a camera, offer large legible keys and easy navigation.
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By Chandra Devi  THE second half of the year will see Sony Ericsson making available more enhanced mobile phones to cater to all levels of users.
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Sony Ericsson today announced the launch of its latest 3G phone for Vodafone&#39;s 3G network, the V800. Not only does it look great, but the V800 is packed with all the goodies we would expect from a top end 3G phone.
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(InfoWorld) - An executive in Microsoft's entertainment and games division Tuesday hinted that Microsoft may be developing its own Windows Mobile OS-based rival to Apple's iPhone. Speaking at Citi's annual Global Technology Conference in New York on Tuesday, Mindy Mount, corporate vice president and CFO for Microsoft's Entertainment and Devices Division, said it's not "unreasonable" to think that Microsoft will integrate photo, music, and touchscreen features into a Windows Mobile product in the future, though she declined to comment on the specifics of when or what that might look like. Microsoft's idea with Windows Mobile has been to move everyday business capabilities, such as accessing e-mail, from the PC to the mobile device. However, most people "tend to have one phone for personal as well as work [use]," Mount said. "Being able to do pictures and music is something that consumers are going to want, so it's a natural thing for us to want in our product roadmap." Microsoft is rumored to be evolving its Zune multimedia player -- its rival to the iPod -- with new features out by the holiday time at the end of the year, though Mount declined to confirm this on Tuesday. But a hybrid product melding Zune, which so far has had lackluster response from consumers, with Windows Mobile features is not completely unrealistic for the future. Microsoft has already worked with hardware partners to develop Windows Mobile handsets with touchscreen capabilities that are similar to the iPhone's. For example, the HTC Touch from High Tech Computer is one of the latest Windows Mobile devices to offer users the ability to use a touchscreen to scroll through e-mail and contacts and browse Web pages. But the HTC Touch smartphone, which is available in the U.K., Europe, and Asia and should makes its North American debut later this year, doesn't have the type of multimedia capabilities that give the iPhone an edge over rival smartphones, at least in the short term. Market research firm iSuppli said Tuesday that in July, its first full month of release, the iPhone outsold popular competitors, such as the Research in Motion Blackberry and Palm Treo devices. Regarding RIM, comments Mount made Tuesday also seemed to shoot downÂ speculation last week that Microsoft is in talks to purchase the Canadian maker of mobile hardware and software. "We don't comment on rumors, but what I would ask people is what that really gets you," she said. Much of RIM's success has been with the device portion of its BlackBerry business, whereas Microsoft has been very successful with using third parties to build its Windows Mobile devices, Mount said. The company sold 11 million Windows Mobile licenses last year and expects to do 20 million in the current fiscal year. "We're pretty happy with that roadmap right now," she said. That roadmap so far does not include Microsoft offering hardware for its Windows Mobile OS, which also means if the company did release an iPhone rival based on Windows Mobile, it's unclear whether it would be through a third party or from the company itself. Still, if the Xbox 360, Zune, and Milan table-top computer with touchscreen features the company previewed earlier this year are any indication, Microsoft seems to be warming up to the idea of offering consumer hardware devices alongside its traditional software, so an iPhone rival from the vendor is within the realm of possibility.
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The world's fourth largest mobile  phone maker Sony Ericsson unveiled seven new mobile phone  models on Sunday, including one high-end cellphone using  Microsoft's Windows Mobile software.
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Sony Ericsson has joined the mobile Internet hardware game by premiering two of its first High Speed Packet Access ExpressCard/34 devices at 3GSM in Barcelona this week.
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft's recently announced Windows Mobile 6 software for smart phones is a step forward for the company, offering some important improvements over previous versions of the software. But just how good is the new software? On Thursday, Microsoft offered me the chance to play with Windows Mobile 6 ahead of the 3GSM show in Barcelona, Spain, next week. The short demonstration, which took place at Microsoft's office in Singapore, was done using a currently available handset: the High Tech ComputerÂ (HTC) S620 smart phone. The S620, also known by its code name Excalibur, sports a small QWERTY keypad, a 2.4-inch QVGA (320 pixels by 240 pixels) screen, and support for GSM (Global System for Mobile Communication), GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) and EDGE (Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution) networks. Powered by Texas Instruments' 200MHz OMAP 850 processor, the smart phone has 128MB of ROM and 64MB of DDR (double data rate) DRAM. But enough about the handset used for the demonstration. What about the software? At first glance, Microsoft's attempt to make Windows Mobile 6 look more like Vista has resulted in a better-looking piece of software, with a new font and a cleaner overall appearance. But the most important improvements to Windows Mobile 6 aren't cosmetic. For starters, Microsoft has added the ability for users to search e-mails and other information stored on Exchange Server 2007 from a smart phone. Windows Mobile 6 also allows users to configure their push mail settings and out-of-office notifications directly from their smart phone, instead of having to use their PCs. Previous versions of Windows Mobile for PDAs allowed users toÂ view Office documents, and that capability has now been added to the smart phone version of the software. In addition, users can now edit their documents. That feature may be useful for some Word and Excel documents, but I have a hard time believing anyone will be using Windows Mobile 6 to edit, or even view, PowerPoint presentations. The screens on these types of devices are just too small for this to be practical. Other improvements to Windows Mobile 6 include offering more information about the people on your contact list. Start typing the name of a contact, say "John" for example, and Windows Mobile 6 brings up a list of contacts named John. Clicking on any one of these names brings detailed information about the contact, including different phone numbers and e-mail addresses, as well as information about your last call -- or missed call -- with the contact. Microsoft also improved the browser and instant-messaging functions in Windows Mobile. For example, you can send text or voice messages to your MSN contacts, while chatting with several contacts simultaneously. If a contact doesn't respond, you can also send a "nudge," which causes the user's phone to vibrate, letting them know that they've received a message. Apart from these features, what struck me most about Windows Mobile 6 was its speed. The software seems much faster than previous versions. Applications opened instantly, without making the user wait. Overall, I was impressed by the newest version of Windows Mobile. Previous versions did not appeal to me, but the improved speed and added features mean Windows Mobile 6 is worth a closer look if you're in the market for a smart phone.
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(InfoWorld) - Japanese operator Willcom has launched a hosted e-mail and personal-information management service based on Microsoft's Exchange Server 2003. The new Access P-Berry service lets users access messages and other information from their Windows Mobile-based W-Zero3 ES smartphones. Introduced in July, the W-Zero3 ES is made by Sharp and is only the second Windows Mobile handset launched in Japan. It's predecessor, the W-Zero3 instantly became a hit when it was the first such handset launched in the market. Other smart phones sold in Japan run either Linux or the Symbian operating system. Intended for small and medium-sized businesses, Willcom's Access P-Berry lets users access e-mails, their calendar, and contacts from their handsets. Pricing for the service, which comes bundled with the handsets, was not available. Microsoft has recently been winning more business from Asian operators. In June, Shanghai Telecom Co.Â  introduced an Exchange-based messaging service for its business customers. The company also won a deal in July to provide the software for an advertising system developed by South Korea's Portal Tone.