BlackBerry poised to hit China
626310
TCL Corp  began sending  BlackBerry handsets to partner China Mobile  in 2007's  fourth quarter, suggesting the launch of the popular email  device in China is just around the corner.
169514
LONDON  - Chinese company Shanghai Automotive Industry Corp. may be ready to step in to save ailing British car manufacturer MG Rover, a media report said.
280522
Research in Motion wins approval to sell its Blackberry handheld e-mail device in China.
619539
Nokia Corp. is getting ready to ship mobile phones based on China&#39;s homegrown 3G (third-generation) mobile standard.
77943
Research in Motion (RIM)&#160;is stepping up its game against Microsoft, Nokia, and other rivals with several enhancements to its BlackBerry software that it will showcase at Lotusphere this week.The updates, coming in new BlackBerry devices and device and server software versions in the first half of this year, will strengthen the platform&#39;s core e-mail capability while adding new messaging, manageability, and security features.RIM pioneered enterprise handheld connectivity with the BlackBerry&#39;s push e-mail system and BES (BlackBerry Enterprise Server). Competitors have since muscled in on this territory, while RIM has invested in software and devices to expand its appeal to the consumer market. With the new features, the company is looking toward a future in which almost all communication capabilities on the desktop are available on the road through a set of capabilities often called unified communications.Among key new capabilities are features that merge voice with instant messaging. Users who run IBM Lotus Sametime or Microsoft Live Communications Server will be able to click on an IM contact on the BlackBerry phone in order to call them or convert an ongoing IM session into a voice call. They will also be able to check whether their colleagues are going to be available before they send out meeting requests.Enhanced e-mail handling will include several new features. Users will be able to search for and retrieve messages on their enterprise e-mail servers that are no longer stored on their BlackBerries. Also, the devices will be able to render HTML and rich text e-mail messages, including font colors and styles, images, hyperlinks, and other elements. After downloading Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel files, users will now be able to edit them on the BlackBerry, thanks to Documents to Go software from DataViz that is being integrated into the mobile platform.Even within e-mail encrypted with PGP or S/MIME, BlackBerry users will be able to view attachments, according to the company.RIM also has some good news for enterprises that want to more easily manage and lock down their employees&#39; devices. They will be able to drill down and define which applications on a BlackBerry can access its GPS functionality as well as enable or shut down specific Bluetooth profiles and set how long the device is &quot;discoverable&quot; using Bluetooth. The less time a phone is discoverable by other Bluetooth devices, the less chance an intruder has to hack it, although this method of breaking into a phone hasn&#39;t been widely exploited.A Web-based device management console is also coming, allowing users to control settings and install software from any Web-connected computer. In addition, administrators will now be able to update users&#39; devices over the air.To help third parties develop their own applications for the BlackBerry, RIM also announced the availability of some additional Java Micro Edition APIs. They include ones to support developing mobile Web services clients, software that uses MMS (Multimedia Messaging Service), and a single application that works for multiple languages and regions.RIM expects to ship its BES version 4.1.5 software for IBM Lotus Domino and for Microsoft Exchange by the end of February. They will be free upgrades for customers with BES version 4.1.0 or later, while others can buy the upgrade for $999 or purchase a Technical Support Services contract. The price of the BES for new customers will remain at $3,999 per server with 20 user licenses included.Version 4.5 of the BlackBerry device software will be required to use many of the end-user features; it will be available in the first half of the year, depending on carrier. It will be a free download from RIM and carrier Web sites. The ability to edit Word and PowerPoint documents will come with version 4.5, but Excel editing capability will be in a later release, expected in the latter part of this year.
440468
TCL Corp  began sending BlackBerry handsets to partner China Mobile  in 2007's fourth quarter, suggesting the launch of the popular email device in China is just around the corner.
158569
College parties met business e-mail on Wednesday as Facebook said it is adding its social-networking platform to Research In Motion Ltd.&#39;s BlackBerry devices.T-Mobile will be the first carrier to build a Facebook application into the BlackBerries it sells, but BlackBerry users on any network will be able to download the application starting later Wednesday, Facebook Co-Founder and Vice President of Engineering Dustin Moskovitz said in a keynote address at the CTIA Wireless IT&#160;and Entertainment show in San Francisco.In the keynote, Moskovitz demonstrated taking a photo with a BlackBerry Curve device, adding tags to it and posting it to Facebook without even starting up the Facebook application. Other features include the ability to set special ringtones for Facebook events and invite friends to join Facebook through BlackBerry e-mail. But it&#39;s the open nature of Facebook&#39;s platform, which allows third parties to add new applications, that sets the company apart, Moskovitz said.The tie-up brings together the highest profile social-networking player, with almost 50 million active users, and an enterprise mobile pioneer vying for market share against Microsoft, Palm, Symbian, Apple, and other device and OS vendors. Executives of the two companies met at the CTIA Wireless Show in March in Orlando and agreed to work together, Moskovitz said. Openness is the key factor they had in common, he said.Starting from a base of thousands of colleges and high schools, Facebook last year opened its network to anyone, and members over 35 years old are the fastest-growing segment, Moskovitz said. RIM has its roots in corporate e-mail tied to specialized enterprise servers so the partnership could help Facebook grow right where it&#39;s catching up.The announcement came amid reports on Wednesday that&#160;Google and Microsoft are wooing Facebook.Facebook also announced a few other advances in the mobile arena, where it expects to have 4 million active users by the end of this month. There are Facebook services available on most major U.S. and Canadian carriers, and Moskovitz announced its first carrier deal outside North America, with O2 (U.K.) Ltd.One extension announced Wednesday lets users add information from third-party Facebook applications as a box in their mobile profiles. As an example, Moskovitz showed a user&#39;s profile that listed two causes he supports. Another extension lets organizations text-message Facebook members to send a text message in support of a cause. The member&#39;s support is immediately reflected on Facebook on the Web, he said.
346409
China Mobile Communications has, for now, broken off talks about serving as Apple's iPhone partner in launching the popular smart phone in China later this year.
664684
(InfoWorld) - Motorola established a development center in China's central Hunan province to help operators and end users develop wireless applications. The center, which was established with backing from the Hunan provincial government, is located in Changsha, where officials hope to create a cluster of companies working on the development of telecommunications services and applications, the company said. In recent years the Chinese government has urged foreign companies, particularly those involved in high-technology industries, to invest more heavily in the country's central and western regions. These areas have typically lagged China's major cities and eastern coast in economic development and foreign investment. Motorola offered few specifics of the Changsha center, saying only that it would serve as a location for the company to work with its customers. Details of the level of financial backing and staffing required for the center were not disclosed. A spokesman for the company could not immediately be reached for comment. Motorola has invested heavily in the creation of research and development centers and other facilities in China. In March, the companyÂ set up a wireless R&D centerÂ in Hangzhou, in China's eastern Zhejiang province. That center, the 17th such facility to be set up by Motorola in China, will develop and test software and hardware for integration into product offerings and will do work on next-generation wireless technologies.ADVERTISEMENTMAKE SOA REAL WITH IBM WEBSPHERE PODCASTStreamline processes and maximize efficiency within a proven service oriented architecture. Take back control of your business processes with IBM WebSphere.
677506
The popular BlackBerry service will finally launch in Taiwan this week after being delayed in order to gain regulatory approval, a company representative confirmed Monday.
317565
British conglomerate Virgin Group Ltd. announced Tuesday that it is in talks with a mainland Chinese telecommunications company to set up a joint venture to provide mobile services in China.
4684
Research in Motion unveiled the highly-anticipated BlackBerry 8800 device at 3GSM World Congress Monday, saying it would be available on AT&T in the US and Rogers in Canada.
544795
Flash memory chip maker Spansion has sharpened its focus on China, revamping management in the Asia Pacific region and striking a deal to farm out some chip production to Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC).Spansion, originally a joint venture between Advanced Micro Devices&#160;and Fujitsu before it&#160;went public, provides NOR flash memory and its own MirrorBit flash chips to the mobile phone market.The changes in management structure and the SMIC deal are designed to boost Spansion&#39;s sales in China&#39;s mobile phone and consumer electronics markets. The management changes include the creation of a new position, president for the Greater China area, which usually includes China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.Several multinationals have increased their focus on China&#39;s mobile phone market in recent years. Research In Motion said Tuesday its popular&#160;BlackBerry handsets will soon be sold in China, an announcement that sent its stock soaring 9.8 percent on the Nasdaq Stock Market to $124.53 per share, despite the fact that most Chinese buy low-cost mobile phones.Last month, Hewlett-Packard, the biggest PC vendor, said it&#160;won a license from the Chinese government to sell more smartphone models&#160;in the country. It&#39;s currently allowed to sell only one smartphone, the hp6515 iPaq.The companies are being lured by China&#39;s rapid growth. It boasted 516 million mobile phone subscribers at the end of August, according to the Ministry of Information Industry of the People&#39;s Republic of China. The world&#39;s largest mobile phone company, China Mobile Communications, counted 350 million subscribers at of the end of September. No other country comes close to those numbers.The U.S. mobile population is at around 246 million, according to the CTIA, while India, which has a population nearly as big as China&#39;s, had 209 million mobile phone users as of the end of September, according to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India.Spansion&#39;s new Greater China president, Gary Wang, will work with customers, government officials and partners to focus Spansion&#39;s business strategies to the requirements of the China market, the company said.Spansion had 2006 full-year sales of $2.6 billion.The agreement with SMIC will allow Spansion to have its MirrorBit flash memory products produced on 12-inch silicon wafers in China, which help reduce costs. The companies expect the deal to help Spansion sell flash chips to Chinese consumer electronics manufacturers.Spansion began outsourcing production of some of its chips to SMIC&#39;s rival, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) last year, but TSMC does not offer production on 12-inch wafers in China. Taiwanese investment regulations prohibit TSMC from producing chips on 12-inch wafers in China. Spansion will continue to contract some manufacturing to TSMC.SMIC will also be able to manufacture and sell MirrorBit Quad chip products to certain markets in China, according to a memorandum of understanding, Spansion said.REFERENCES:HP wins license to sell more smartphones in China, Sep. 13, 2007First BlackBerry comes to China, with Alcatel-Lucent&#39;s help, Oct. 24, 2007
438062
Research In Motion Ltd   has shipped the first of its BlackBerry smartphones to China  and aims to start selling them later this year, a major  breakthrough for the company in penetrating the huge Asian  market.
383563
Research in Motion has received clearance to sell its popular BlackBerry device in China after eight years of trying. The Canadian-based company says it's finalizing the delivery of its products there.
564539
Research In Motion Ltd.  is seeing rising demand for its BlackBerry wireless e-mail device in Europe and expects Asia to be its next major market, the company's chief financial officer said on Monday.
501983
Shares of BlackBerry maker Research in  Motion Ltd  jumped more than 6 percent to a  record $121.10 on Tuesday after the company announced it had  entered a deal to distribute its BlackBerry smartphones in  China with Alcatel-Lucent .