Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1 blocked from sale in the US
A federal court in California has blocked the sale of Samsung's Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet in the U.S. in a patent dispute between Apple and Samsung.
Samsung intends to appeal.
In an order on Tuesday granting the preliminary injunction, Judge Lucy H. Koh of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, San Jose division has enjoined Samsung and its U.S. subsidiaries from importing or selling within the U.S. the tablet or any "product that is no more than colorably different from this specified product and embodies any design contained in U.S. Design Patent No. D504,889." Read more...
New Samsung chief: I want SOFTWARE
Samsung is going to have to do better in software if it wants to stay up near the top of the tech industry, its new CEO said today.
"Samsung needs to improve its competitiveness in software, and is now at a crossroads. To become the top global technology company, we need to challenge and innovate continuously. I will give more authority to our employees for creative ideas," shiny new chief exec Kwon Oh-hyun said in his inaugural speech, reported by the Korea Times.
He said that the company could only produce new customer experiences and value by strengthening its capabilities in design, user experience, solutions and software. Read more...
Samsung fights Apple move to block Galaxy sales
Samsung Electronics Co. said Thursday it will fight Apple's move to stop U.S. sales of its new Galaxy phone in the latest flare-up of an intellectual property battle between the world's top smartphone makers.
Samsung said it will vigorously oppose Apple's request for a court to ban sales of the Galaxy S III smartphone and still plans to go ahead with the device's scheduled release in the U.S. on June 21.
The South Korean company said in a statement that it will "demonstrate to the court that the Galaxy S III is innovative and distinctive." Read more...
Samsung is introducing ‘pop-up’ stores in London for a slice of that Olympic money
Samsung has revealed that it will introduce ‘pop-up’ mobile stores in London at the end of May, as it seeks to grab a share of increased consumer spending while the UK capital hosts the 2012 Olympic Games.
The ‘Samsung Mobile PIN’ will come to Westfield in Shepherd’s Bush and Old Spitalfields Market on May 29, offering customers an “immersive” and more convenient way to peruse products or shop for a new device from the Korean giant’s stores. Read more...
Samsung launches low-end Windows Phone with 4-inch display
Samsung Electronics Friday unveiled the Samsung Omnia M, a Windows Phone with a 4-inch Super AMOLED display that will first become available in Europe.
Samsung isn't providing any pricing, but the phone's specification suggests it will compete with Nokia's low-end phone, the Lumia 610.
The Omnia M has 384MB of RAM, less than the 512MB found in most Windows Phones. The Lumia 610 has 256MB. Read more...
Samsung acquires mSpot to gives its phones a cloud media boost
How do you make your smartphones stand out in 2012? Well, you could try constantly cramming the latest hardware into your handsets, but everyone else is doing that, too. You can’t rely on the operating system to set your phones apart, either, unless you’re Apple or RIM and no one else can use the OS. Read more...
New Galaxy S III phone is bigger and smarter
At a press event in London on Thursday that it described as an "unpacking," Samsung indeed rolled out an impressive array of hardware and software enhancements that the company hopes will help it retain its ranking as the top cellphone-maker in the world.
The biggest feature (literally) most consumers will notice is a stunning 4.8-inch Super AMOLED screen. That's about a half-inch larger than Samsung's Galaxy S II, and significantly bigger than the 3.5-inch high-resolution display on the Apple iPhone 4S. Despite the large screen, the S III actually is a bit thinner than the iPhone 4S (8.6mm vs. 9.33mm) and is slightly lighter as well (133 grams vs. 140 grams). Read more...
Smartphones fuel Samsung profit to record
A surge in Galaxy smartphone sales fueled earnings at Samsung Electronics to a record high in the first quarter, usually a tough season for the global consumer electronics industry, outshining handset rivals such as Nokia Corp.
Samsung sold more smartphones in the first three months of the year than Apple Inc. and raked in more than 70 percent of its operating profit from mobile businesses. Shares of Samsung Electronics Co. shot up nearly 3 percent.
Net profit nearly doubled from a year earlier to a record 5.05 trillion won ($4.46 billion) for the fiscal quarter ended March 31.
Operating profit also logged a record high: 5.85 trillion won, which was in line with the company's guidance provided earlier this month. Sales rose 22 percent from a year earlier to 45.3 trillion won. Read more...
HTC to develop its own processors, mimicking Apple and Samsung, in deal with ST-Ericsson: Report
In an attempt to reduce its reliance on third-party processor makers, HTC has reportedly signed a memorandum of cooperation with ST-Ericsson to develop its own mobile chips, following the same route as its rivals Apple and Samsung.
According to a report by the China Times, HTC will develop a dedicated application processor that will be incorporated into its low-end smartphones when production starts next year.
Facing increased competition in the smartphone market as of late, HTC has been forced to overhaul its device strategies, focusing on ‘hero’ devices that started with the launch of the HTC One range of Android smartphones that fused impressive hardware specifications with a tighter software experience that built upon Google’s Android operating system. Read more...
Samsung Finally Pushes Ice Cream Sandwich To The Galaxy S IIs Of The World
Well, after a bit of a false start, Samsung finally seems to have done it. According to a new blog post on the official Samsung Tomorrow blog, the Korean consumer electronics giant has finally begun to push their Ice Cream Sandwich update out to the Galaxy S IIs of the world.
And with that, Galaxy S II owners began once again to feel the love. Or at least, most of them did. The update in question is meant for international spec Galaxy S II (the GT-I9100), so State-side owners of a AT&T/T-Mobile Galaxy S II or a Sprint Epic 4G Touch won’t be joining in the official fun just yet. Read more...
Samsung boss sued by his brother over stock inheritance
Samsung Electronics chairman Lee Kun-hee is being sued by his brother over stocks inherited from their father, the Samsung Group founder Lee Byung-chull.
Lee Maeng-hee has filed the suit in Seoul, alleging that his younger brother secretly incorporated a huge amount of Samsung stocks into his assets, Korean news agency Yonhap reported.
Maeng-hee wants the court to order the chairman to return 8.24 million shares in Samsung Life Insurance – worth 716.9 billion won ($636m, £404m) according to today's closing price – and 20 stocks in Samsung Electronics, along with 100 million won ($88,800, £56,427).
He claims that their father put these shares in a trust under the names of a number of Samsung Group executives, but Kun-hee transferred the stocks to himself after their father's death in 1987. Read more...
Samsung wins against Apple in the Netherlands on tablet design
The Court of Appeal in The Hague has ruled that the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 is sufficiently different from Apple's European design patent that the tablet can remain on sale in the Netherlands.
Samsung welcomed Tuesday's ruling, which affirmed an August 2011 ruling that the design of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 is distinctive and does not infringe Apple's intellectual property rights, a spokesman said via email. The ruling again demonstrates that Apple's products simply do not warrant the intellectual property protections that it believes they should have, he added.
One of Apple's core legal claims against Samsung is that its rival copied the design of Apple's products. Apple has argued that it's no coincidence that Samsung's latest products look a lot like the iPhone and iPad, from the shape of the hardware to the user interface and even the packaging. Read more...
CES: Coming soon, drones for home and office
Samsung had a robotic floor sweeper at CES that's equipped with a camera and speaker. The electronics maker wants you to think about its potential.
Let's say you're at work and you connect, via an app, to your Navibot floor sweeper. You can adjust the camera position on the unit, as well as control its movement via the controller. By shifting the camera's position around the room, this leads to the discovery that the dog is asleep on the couch. Your next step is to shout into your tablet's microphone "bad doggy" -- and presumably the dog will jump off the couch once it hears your voice coming from Navibot.
The Navibot that was demonstrated as CES is an upgrade from earlier versions. Pricing was not yet available.
This Samsung sweeper also uses the camera to map the room for navigation.
But there is another category of drone-like devices that rely more on human controls and may find a place in the workplace and home, if you can get past their seemingly out-of-body experience.
In the ocean of vendors at CES, was Mantaro, a Germantown, Md.-based firm that's selling a device that doesn't sweep floors, but could act as your physical substitute at a business meeting. Read more...
Samsung, LG to launch Google TVs, joining Sony and Vizio
Google said Thursday that TV heavyweights Samsung and LG will launch sets that run its Google TV platform, with new models to be showcased at the International Consumer Electronics Show next week in Las Vegas.
The U.S. search giant has so far failed to impress the industry with the Internet TV platform it launched in 2010. The interface was seen as too confusing for lay users, and Google suffered setbacks as key supplier Logitech pulled its support after losing over US$100 million, and the major U.S. networks blocked video streaming from their websites.
But with televisions sets now seen as the last frontier for Internet content, after computers, phones and tablets, Google has steadily improved its Android-based platform. Google TV got a major software overhaul in October, and the company has continued to market it to hardware and component makers. Read more...
Sony, Samsung dissolve panel joint venture
Japan's Sony and South Korean rival Samsung are dissolving their joint venture in liquid crystal display panels as Sony tries to stanch years of losses in its TV business.
Sony Corp. said Monday that Samsung Electronics Co. will buy all of Sony's shares in the joint venture for about 1.08 trillion Korean won ($935 million) subject to a final agreement.
The joint venture called S-LCD was set up in 2004. Sony, which fell behind in flat panel TVs, invested in a Samsung panel factory to ensure a steady supply of panels for its LCD TVs.
Sony's TV operation has lost money for seven straight years and the company is straining to return that key business to profit. Read more...