Consumer Technology World Brief
Mobile World Congress was hosted in the Mobile World Capital Barcelona where more than 72,000 attendees from 200 countries were treated to a wealth of learning and networking opportunities, product showcases and announcements. More than 1,700 companies showcased their organizations through exhibition halls which provided glimpses of exciting new phones, tablets, mobile devices, back-end solutions, technologies, applications, accessories, and more. With a slew of new phones and devices being unveiled; Mozilla Firefox released its own mobile operating system (OS) competing head-on with Android and iOS. The OS is a HTML5 web-based browser sitting on top of Android kernels and all apps are delivered through the browser – similar to how the iPhone used web apps when it was first launched in 2007. Initially, Firefox Mobile OS will run on low-end devices with processors of 1GHz or less and Mozilla has said that Firefox will eventually be modified to work with more powerful handsets, but for now it is concentrating on the low end.
Google’s next big consumer product came into sharper focus with the release of a video showing off the smart functions of Glass, formerly known as “Google Glass.” The company is also kick-starting the hype machine for an eventual retail launch with a contest that gives consumers a chance to explore Glass’s futuristic and voice-activated features. After nearly two years of research, testing and developers-only access, Google announced that consumers would finally be next to view the world through Glass, the company’s augmented-reality glasses project. The video released by Google shows off the user interface. A camera records every moment with hands-free functions via voice control through bone conductivity, and the commands can trigger connected data such as weather and GPS driving directions. It also shows a few more functions that Glass is able to perform. “It seems like there is a lot of user invocation services,” Silva added. Many of the functions shown were reactive technologies with users giving voice commands: “Take a picture,” “Look up directions,” etc. Google also introduced the available colors for Glass. The augmented reality lenses will be in charcoal, tangerine, shale, cotton and sky.
North America Review
Budget fights in Congress took their most serious turn in years on March 1st when USD 85 billion in indiscriminate spending cuts known as “sequestration” began to kick in after both parties failed to agree on how to stop them. Democrats predict the automatic cuts could soon cause air-traffic delays, meat shortages as food safety inspections slow down, and hundreds of thousands of furloughs for federal workers. Republicans have long argued that the only way to tame budget deficits over the long haul is by slowing the cost of sprawling social safety net programs. These include the Social Security retirement program and Medicare and Medicaid healthcare programs for the elderly, disabled and poor that are becoming more expensive as a large segment of the U.S. population hits retirement age.
In comments made at Mobile World Congress 2013 and reported by Edaily, mobile chief JK Shin has said that the Galaxy S 4 will indeed be shown off for the first time at a Samsung Unpacked event in New York City. It’ll be the first time a flagship Samsung smartphone has been unveiled in the US since the original Galaxy S back in 2010. The successor to the Galaxy SIII, which was an unbelievable success for Samsung, is awaited with a lot of anticipation. It is believed that the new Galaxy phone will be more focused on features instead of new hardware tech. It is understandable that Samsung will not be straying from the plastic method of phone construction as it is a method for them to create a more durable phone and given the production constraints they face.
Asia Review
China has overtaken the US as the world’s largest net importer of oil, in a generational shift that will shake up the geopolitics of natural resources. The US has been the world’s largest net importer of oil since the mid-1970s, shaping Washington’s foreign policy towards energy-rich countries such as Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Venezuela. As China overtakes the US as the world’s leading net oil importer, Beijing is likely to face pressure to take a larger role in patrolling the world’s key shipping lanes. China has already taken a more assertive foreign oil policy in countries such as Sudan, Angola and Iraq, where state-owned Chinese companies have invested billions of dollars. Although December figures are often volatile due to end-of-the-year tax reasons, analysts and traders say the shift will continue, affecting global oil trade routers and the geopolitics of energy. The figures include crude and refined petroleum products such as diesel and kerosene.
Sharp Corp, the loss-making Japanese electronics maker, is in talks to obtain an investment of about 10 billion yen (USD 107 million) from Samsung Electronics Co. Japan’s biggest maker of liquid-crystal displays is raising funds after forecasting a record loss for the year through March. The maker of Aquos TVs lost 55 percent of its market value last year and warned in November about its ability to survive after hemorrhaging 103 billion yen in cash from operations in the fiscal first half. Sharp has cut staff and agreed to sell a stake to Qualcomm Inc. as it tries to restructure because of slowing demand for its TVs and competition from rivals, including Samsung.
Europe Review
France, Spain and Italy dragged the euro zone into a deeper downturn in February, according to business surveys that showed the chasm between these countries and prosperous Germany widening yet again. The divide between Germany and France, the euro zone’s two biggest economies, grew to its widest since the currency union’s inception in 1999. For the euro zone, the outlook depends largely on whether Germany can keep up its economic growth and offset struggling France, Italy and Spain, according to Chris Williamson, chief economist at PMI compiler Markit.
European Union anti-trust regulators are set to hit Microsoft with a hefty fine on Wednesday for breaking a promise to offer consumers using its Windows system a choice of rival Internet browsers, people familiar with the case said. EU anti-trust chief Joaquin Almunia is expected to use the fine – which could run into hundreds of millions of euros – to set an example after the software giant became the first company to break a promise made to end an anti-trust probe. EU anti-trust regulators said this did not happen for a period during February 2011 and July 2012, a lapse Microsoft blamed on a technical error. It has said it since tightened internal procedures to avoid a repeat. The European Commission has already fined Microsoft 1.6 billion euros (USD 2.1 billion) to date for not providing data at fair prices to rivals and for tying its media player to its operating system.