Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Samsung Agrees to Pay Microsoft for Using Android




Microsoft announced today that it has signed a definitive agreement with Samsung, to cross-license the patent portfolios of both companies, providing broad coverage for each company's products. Under the terms of the agreement, Microsoft will receive royalties for Samsung's mobile phones and tablets running the Android mobile platform. In addition, the companies agreed to cooperate in the development and marketing of Windows Phone.

"Microsoft and Samsung see the opportunity for dramatic growth in Windows Phone and we're investing to make that a reality," said Andy Lees, president, Windows Phone Division, Microsoft. "Microsoft believes in a model where all our partners can grow and profit based on our platform."

"Through the cross-licensing of our respective patent portfolios, Samsung and Microsoft can continue to bring the latest innovations to the mobile industry," said Dr. Won-Pyo Hong, executive vice president of global product strategy at Samsung's mobile communication division. "We are pleased to build upon our long history of working together to open a new chapter of collaboration beginning with our Windows Phone "Mango" launch this fall."

FOSS Patents notes that "This is the most important Android-related intellectual property deal in its own right, and even more significant against the background of Google's proposed acquisition of Motorola Mobility. If Samsung truly believed that Google's acquisition of Motorola Mobility was going to be helpful to the Android ecosystem at large, it would have waited until that deal is closed before concluding the license agreement with Microsoft. But Samsung probably knows it can't rely on Google. It decided to address Android's intellectual property issues on its own."

Interestingly, it appears that Samsung was able to negotiate a lower licensing fee by promising to work with Microsoft to promote Windows Phone 7. Microsoft's mobile operating system has received good reviews but has seen low adoption rates and the company working hard to negotiate deals with manufacturers to push the OS.



*thanks iclarified*

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Friday, September 23, 2011

Why are there Apple logos in the backdrop of a Samsung store? UPDATED: Replaced with “S” icons




UPDATE [Monday, September 26, 2011 at 11:30am ET]: The Sammy Hub blog pointed out that Samsung has replaced all the wrong icons by an “S,” as seen in another image after the break.

Spotted by the folks over at CNET, an Italian Samsung store actually has Apple logos in the backdrop. You’ll noticed circled that there are App Store and Safari logos. Alright we’re just going to put this out there, Samsung — what the hell happened here? With all of the legal proceedings going underway, we’d think Samsung would try to step away from this kind-of thing.


*thanks 9to5mac*

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Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Motorola's Threats Against Android Drove Google Acquisition?




Google's purchase of Motorola may have been driven by Motorola threats against Android, reports FOSS Patents.

Google offered $12.5 billion for Motorola, a 60% premium, not because it needed the company's patents but because it wanted to prevent Motorola from taking four actions that would have seriously damaged Android.

This wasn't about MMI telling Google: "buy us, and together we'll protect the Android ecosystem". This was more like MMI telling Google: "buy us, or else we'll immediately do three or four things that will make sense for us but be absolutely devastating for Android".

The four things Motorola reportedly planed to do were:

1. MMI would have taken a royalty-bearing patent license from Microsoft, and possibly also settled with Apple.

2. MMI would have revisited its exclusive focus on Android and possibly adopted Windows Phone.

3. MMI would have attacked other Android device makers with its patents to make their products more expensive.

4. MMI would have conducted a public or private auction of the entire company or large parts of its patent portfolio.

FOSS Patents concludes that "the $12.5 billion price represents protection money. But not in the way most people seem to think."

Hit this link for a much more detailed analysis.




*thanks iclarified*

Cross-posted on limerain_com

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Monday, September 12, 2011

Samsung Galaxy S II clocks the fastest GPU in any current smartphone, but it likely won’t be a match for iPhone 5




Image courtesy of Anandtech

Anandtech has published some interesting findings based on their extensive Samsung Galaxy S II review. It’s the first smartphone to use the graphics processing unit based on the Mali-400 core from ARM Holdings, a fables chip maker from the UK. In fact, Samsung has engineered and manufactured its own system-on-a-chip solution for the handset.

They call it the Exynos 4210 and it combines a dual-core Cortex-A9 CPU core and the aforementioned Mali-400 GPU sporting four cores. The resulting performance, says Anandtech, is comparable to Texas Instruments OMAP 4 chip that incorporates Imagination Technologies’ PowerVR SGX540 GPU core. However, the quad-core 1.2GHz Exynos 4210 probably won’t hold a candle to iPhone 5, which will likely carry the same dual-core processor-GPU combo as the iPad 2′s 1GHz A5 chip:

Samsung implemented a 4-core version of the Mali-400 in the 4210 and its resulting performance is staggering as you can see above. Although it’s still not as fast as the PowerVR SGX 543MP2 found in the iPad 2, it’s anywhere from 1.7 – 4x faster than anything that’s shipping in a smartphone today.
Interestingly, and per the GL Benchmark included below, the Exynos 4210 is more than twice as fast compared to the Galaxy Tab 10.1 that runs Nvidia’s Tegra 2 chip and nearly four times speedier than iPhone 4′s 800 MHz A4 chip that sports the PowerVT SGX535 GPU core. However, the 4210 falls short in the triangle throughput department, a big disadvantage over the iPad 2′s A5 processor that clocks nine times the graphics performance of the original iPad’s A4 chip.

Triangle throughput is important in graphics-intensive games and will become key in “future games that may scale along that vector rather than simply increasing pixel shader complexity”. The video of Anandtech’s Samsung Galaxy S II review below..





*thanks 9to5mac*
Cross-posted on limerain_com

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Wednesday, September 7, 2011

HTC sues Apple with Google’s patents




In a report from Bloomberg, HTC has apparently filed claims of patent infringement against Apple after acquiring patents from Google last week.

The patents were apparently snatched up by Google sometime over the last year from the original owners including Motorola Inc., Palm Inc., and Openwave Systems Inc. According to the US Patent and Trademark Office, they were then transferred by Google to HTC on September 1st.

Six days after acquiring the nine patents, HTC today filed a suit in Delaware against Apple claiming patent infringement on four of the patents (originally issued to Motorola) that they acquired from Google. However, they aren’t letting the remaining patents go to waste either, they also filed a complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission for five of the others (two originally owned by Palm and three by Openwave).

While there aren’t many more details regarding Google’s specific motivation, Apple’s ongoing infringement claims against Android vendors (notably HTC and Samsung) certainly doesn’t help. Perhaps Google is really serious about protecting Android and its partners. This isn’t HTC’s first time entering litigation with Apple. As of July, HTC’s general counsel made the company’s stance on Apple’s “constant attempts at litigations” clear after Apple attempted to block imports of HTC devices with the International Trade Commission:

HTC is disappointed at Apple’s constant attempts at litigations instead of competing fairly in the market. HTC strongly denies all infringement claims raised by Apple in the past and present and reiterates our determination and commitment to protect our intellectual property rights.

*thanks 9to5mac*

Cross-posted on limerain_com

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Sunday, September 4, 2011

Apple successfully blocks Samsung from showing off Galaxy Tab 7.7 at IFA in Germany


(We got a look at the Tab 7.7 before it was pulled)

Apple won a pretty significant victory today in its attempts to block Samsung from selling its iPad competitor products in Germany and in greater Europe. This week’s IFA show is a CES-like pan-European event which showcases new consumer products from just about everyone except Apple.

Most of the buzz this year however is around two of Samsung’s new products, the Galaxy Tab 7.7 and the Galaxy Note 5.3. Both have 1280×800 SuperAMOLED Displays and run Android 3.2 but the Tab falls under the line of products that Apple is trying to block and is currently under a set of injunctions in various parts of the world.

Interestingly, Samsung was originally showing the 7.7 devices to reporters with “not for sale in Germany” stickers attached. However last night, Samsung started removing the devices from the floor and covering up the advertisements like the product never existed (below).



It appears that Apple got Samsung to block the whole Tab line. The Tab 7.7 is much smaller than the iPad weighing only 334 grams, yet has a higher resolution screen – so it appears that Apple’s injunction is very broad.

Bloomberg reports:

Samsung, Apple’s closest rival in tablet computers, pulled the just-unveiled Galaxy Tab 7.7 out of the IFA consumer- electronics show in Berlin after a Dusseldorf court on Sept. 2 granted Apple’s request to ban sales and marketing of the product, James Chung, a Seoul-based spokesman for Samsung, said by telephone today. “Samsung respects the court’s decision,” Chung said, adding that the company believes it “severely limits consumer choice in Germany.” Samsung will pursue all available options, including legal action, to defend its intellectual property rights, he said.
It will be interesting to see what direction this goes. Will Apple be able to successfully block Samsung’s (and others’) tablets for sale across the world? There is some concern that if Apple doesn’t win in these cases, damages to Samsung could be significant.



Images via ThisismyNext

*thanks 9to5mac*
Cross-posted on limerain_com

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- Posted using my iPhone 4