Adding to TiPb’s AT&T store inventory report from earlier this week (above), BGR has posted an image (below) of Case-Mate’s apparent iPhone 5 cases listed in AT&T’s inventory system. The leak comes before Apple’s announcement of the iPhone 5 and/or iPhone 4S Tuesday.
MacRumorsmentions three different iPhone 5 case designs listed in AT&T’s inventory system, the Barely There, Pop!, and Tough cases, so an iPhone 5 could make sense. Next Tuesday is sure to be a big event, but in the meantime read what we know about Apple’s newest iPhone.
According to a poorly translated report from Macotakara, China Unicom’s Deputy Director of Research has confirmed an iPhone 5 with HSPA+ capabilities (21Mbps) during a keynote at Macworld Asia 2011. The image above is from the presentation viaPC Watch.
Japanese IT News Site ” PC Watch “Tells That, Research vice president of China Unicom , Huan Wenliang, told iPhone five Will Support W-CDMA based high-speed Data Transfer standard HSPA Evolution “HSPA +” (21Mbps) at Keynote speech in Macworld Asia 2011.
We’ve heard rumors that Apple is in early testing of LTE-capable test devices, and we know AT&T has already started rolling out their HSPA+ tech and even marketing HSPA devices as “4G”.
Curiously, the Qualcomm Gobi MDM6600 chips found in the Verizon iPhone support HSPA+ data rates of up to 14.4 Mbps. Analysts are expecting a 4G LTE iPhone in 2012. (via MacRumors and MacPost)
Just like Verizon, T-Mobile has chosen to side with Samsung in its fight against Apple reportsFoss Patents. T-Mobile’s reason, in response to a preliminary injunction proposed by Apple, is that they don’t want key 4G devices to be banned for the holiday season. And since it doesn’t look like T-Mobile is getting the iPhone anytime soon, Samsung’s 4G phones could be a big part of their sales. Check out T-Mobile’s response below:
Stocks of Apple’s component suppliers are experiencing increases stemming from today’s announcement confirming a next-gen iPhone related media event for October 4th.
Among them, Qualcomm, expected to provide the device’s GSM and CDMA compatible Gobi baseband chips, is up 3.9% as of this report. Broadcom Corp., providing wireless chip related components is up 3.5%, Gorilla-glass maker Corning is up 5.92%, and CMOS image sensor supplier OmniVision Technologies Inc. is up 3.4%.
Nuance Communications, Inc. is also up 5%, which many are speculating is due to the new iPhone’s Nuance-powered speech-to-text feature and the implications of the “Let’s talk iPhone” slogan on the iPhone event invites.
Other stocks from lesser known power amplifier component makers including Avago Technologies, TriQuint Semniconductor, and Skyworks Solutions were all also on the increase as of this report.
T-Mobile’s CMO Cole Brodman recently published a letter addressing customers regarding the iPhone. While yesterday he confirmed the carrier would not be receiving the new iPhone come October, he described their desire to offer a “no-compromise iPhone experience” to current users:
“We’ve heard from many customers who love their T-Mobile service, but are disappointed that we don’t carry the iPhone. To these customers, first, thank you for your business. Please know that we think the iPhone is a great device and Apple knows that we’d like to add it to our line-up. Today, there are over a million T-Mobile customers using unlocked iPhones on our network. We are interested in offering all of our customers a no-compromise iPhone experience on our network.”
Of course the ability to capitalize on the over 1 million iPhone users currently on T-Mobile’s network that purchased the device elsewhere would be a huge advantage. Brodman then points out the carrier’s other offerings with the recently launched Galaxy S II and notes Android is outpacing iPhone in “consumer adoption, market share and capabilities like support for faster 4G networks”. He did, however, reiterate the carrier’s desire to get an iPhone in their lineup yesterday saying it’s in Apple’s hands now and that they are waiting for “that call”.
As noted by MacRumors, Apple has been denied the tradmark for multi-touch, which they applied for on January 9, 2007 after the first iPhone was introduced. Once the decision was reached by the the Board, Apple then filed for an appeal which was then again shot-down. Excerpt from the decision that is embedded after the break:
Again, simply because the applied-for term has been used in association with a highly successful product does not mean the term has acquired distinctiveness. Decision: The examining attorney’s finding that the Section 2(f) showing is insufficient is affirmed.
Apple was denied the trademark simply because it is too broad, and lacks distinctiveness to Apple alone. As a reference, NYU’s Jeff Han has multiple mentions of Multi-Touch as a generic term in papers from 2005 and before. Here’s his multi-touch video demonstration more than a year before Apple filed for ‘Multi-Touch’ or released the iPhone.
Sources close to Apple’s manufacturing and supply chain (viaDIGITIMES) claim Apple, along with others from the “non-Apple camp”, is prepping to produce devices that include curved glass, specifically touchscreens, in early 2012.
“…Apple reportedly also has bought glass polishing equipment for its suppliers in preparation for the production of devices fitted with curved cover glass. Lens Technology, Fuji Crystal, G-Tech are said to be major cover glass suppliers of Apple. While Lens and Fuji focus on iPhones, G-Tech supplies mainly for iPad.”
The report notes that other companies were expected to use curved cover glass in “attempts to gain a competitive edge” over Apple in the current iPhone and iPad dominated smarpthone and tablet markets. We’ve certainly heard of the company’s plans for curved glass in Apple’s retail stores and their new spaceship campus, but only heard rumors and speculation regarding possible consumer product applications.
Here’s the story (via Daring Fireball). The short of it is that Verizon asks the court not to issue Apple’s requested injunction against Samsung products because an injunction “is not in the public interest… It significantly limits consumer options and crippling the free flow of goods to Verizon and its customers”.
The obvious response is what injunction wouldn’t?
The question is: why would Verizon throw its weight behind Samsung in this battle now that it has the iPhone?
Perhaps Verizon isn’t as happy with the iPhone and as they were in early 2011.
Notice the love start to peel away in the video below. Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam was expecting to have an iPhone 5 this summer and counts that as a reason for missing targets in the third quarter. Revenues overall are flat and Verizon isn’t seeing the LTE money they were hoping for. Samsung obviously sells a bunch of LTE phones and Tablets that Verizon wants to capitalize on (and has a lot invested in) including the Galaxy Tab 10.1, Droid Charge, and the Droid Nexus Prime due out later this year…
Having a look at the otherwise impressive Galaxy S II phones from Samsung, I noticed that the USB AC power adapter had a ‘familiar’ feel to it. Turns out, it is almost an exact replica, within a millimeter in every direction. Compare to their previous USB power adapter.
If all of the rumors are true, Amazon has a 7-inch “media tablet” that runs a forked version of Android and will connect to all of Amazon’s services, including its Appstore, Movies, TV, Music and of course eBooks. It won’t be true multi-touch but the rumored price is half of the iPad’s (just like the screen) at $250. Who is making this for Amazon? Foxconn of course.
Ars Technica points us to source code from the latest version of the LLVM-based default compiler within Xcode showing what appears to be support for Marvell’s ARM compliant Armada XP processor. Of course this has lead to speculation that Apple is potentially considering the processors for next-gen iOS devices, but as Ars points out, even the least exciting scenario would mean good things to come: Expand Expanding Close
Adding some validity to the possibility of a new iPhone branded “4S”, @chronicwire has just posted the images below showing the iPhone 4S branding on what looks like legit packaging for a new Otter Box iPhone case.
Another couple if you head down south. Notice the changed volume buttons that may or may not be indicative of a volume button to camera shutter feature.
LEAK: Photo of the back of the package showing the iPhone 4S case, depicting new volume buttons, and on the right side. New soft-looking volume buttons being on right side of iPhone 4S can probably be attributed to the “volume button to take pic” iOS5 feature
She explained that the ad reflected the current conversations going on in the blogosphere. “Like many, we are watching the rumor sites and using information to plan ahead as much as we can.” Otterbox promises support for whatever iPhone debuts, but they’re emphatically not stating or leaking anything further. “We do not have any confidentiality agreements with Apple,” Richardson told TUAW.
As for those iPhone 4S Otterbox packaging photos that leaked yesterday, she explained, “What was circulating yesterday was not a case image for the iPhone 4S but a packaging design.” Otterbox has not identified the source of the photos. Expand Expanding Close
I have taken the position that the AT&T merger with T-Mobile was kind of like gravity. It had to occur, because you had a company with a T-Mobile that had the spectrum but didn’t have the capital to build it out. AT&T needed the spectrum, they didn’t have it in order to take care of their customers, and so that match had to occur.
I don’t think that I’ve heard a rationale for the merger stated more succinctly.
But coming from AT&T and T-Mobile’s biggest rival, you know it is a bunch of horses**t.
Since when does a company CEO say something to the effect of “We want our competitors to be stronger and better equipped to compete with us and take our customers”?
The reason why Verizon is in favor of the deal is because it eliminates a low-cost player in the market and brings the U.S. closer to a telecom duopoly, in which AT&T and Verizon can set prices. Just recently, Verizon was forced to offer a $50 pre-paid data plan that competes with Sprint’s Virgin and T-Mobile. With Verizon/AT&T running the show, they won’t need to make moves like that.
It’s pretty obvious to anyone not on an AT&T or Verizon payroll (including fifteen members of Congress led by North Carolina’s Heath Shuler) that a merger would be horrific for wireless competition in this country.
No one with an eighth-grade education really believes that any merger, telecom or otherwise, has ever created jobs or competition in the marketplace which is what AT&T is somehow trying to argue. Hopefully this thing is killed. Soon. Expand Expanding Close
During an event this afternoon, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley stated that her office would begin looking into fraudulent purchases on the iTunes Store. Coakley herself was a victim of fraudulent purchases, after her credit card was stolen and used on the Store — reports ThreatPost.
Coakley said that her investment in protecting consumers from identity theft was personal, acknowledging that her bank account was emptied after cyber criminals stole her debit card information during a ski trip to New Hampshire. It was not the first time Coakley had mentioned the incident in public. After skimming the card info, Coakley said the thieves attempted to use it to purchase a laptop from Dell Computer, which detected the fraudulent transaction and contacted Coakley. Not so Apple, whose iTunes media store was used to make a slew of transactions that emptied the Attorney General’s account.
Coakley’s case is that while Dell was able to recognize that her credit card was stolen, iTunes wasn’t able to, and her card was then drained in a short amount of time from a huge amount of Store purchases. Coakley cites that these circumstances fall under the State’s data privacy law, and her cabinet will begin an investigation against Apple. A stumbling block however, is that it’s not clear whether Apple holds the credit card data (Apple often touts that they’ve got xx million credit cards on file) or that it just merely passes through without Apple’s knowledge according to the report.
As part of the Senate Judiciary hearings today, former FTC official (and new Google employee) Susan Creighton, testified under oath today that Google, Microsoft and Yahoo! all bid to become the default search engine on iOS’s Mobile Safari Web Browser. As we know, Google won, and as we can infer, Apple gets some revenue from Google for making it its default search engine. As we know from Apple being Apple, the quality of the search results was probably as big a part of the decision as the relatively small bits of revenue.
But as part of the testimony, Creighton said briefly (before she was cut off) that 2/3rds of mobile search comes from Apple iOS devices. That’s pretty interesting considering the share of Android devices in the market. But not altogether surprising considering the web browser market share which includes those millions and millions of iPads.
Video at 2:24.00 (during very interesting testimony around Apple picking Google as default search)
Clearly, Sprint CEO Dan Hesse knows (whether or not) he’s getting the iPhone in a few weeks. But he’s obviously sworn to secrecy by Apple.
The problem is that he has to tell investors how he’s going to come up with all of the additional money and subscribers that will come with getting the iPhone and offering it on unlimited data plans. When asked about the “rumored device” he said,
“If we get it–if–we may have to adjust our guidance for that,”
Last week, Sprint CFO Joe Euteneuer did the same dance, saying that Sprint’s network could handle the iPhone, not that it was getting it.
It will indeed be interesting to see how Sprint’s network can handle the iPhone, especially with unlimited plans.
In other ‘News’, Al Gore mentioned that Apple would be releasing new iPhones next month.
Last week, we posted a picture from the same vantage point of the un-opened flagship Hong Kong Apple Store at IFC Center. Today however, one of our wonderful tipsters has sent over a first look at the new Hong Kong Apple Store with the curtains taken down. As you can see, this Apple Store is looking absolutely beautiful!
In the inside, you’ll notice employees beginning their training for the grand opening this Saturday, September 24th. Notice that glass staircase running through the center?
Among a bunch of Google+ improvements announced today, Google said it would bring Hangouts to mobile phones including iPhone (and iPad 2 and 4G iPod likely). We’re big fans of Google Hangouts and having it on mobile is going to be really great. They are also offering Hangout broadcasts which might be fun ways to broadcast a keynote for instance :D
Google announced a bunch of other big Google Plus stuff including open invitations today. Check full coverage on 9to5Google.com Expand Expanding Close
The Onion joked that Tim Cook’s first order of business as CEO would be to begin making printers again. Of course that is a bad idea. But, let’s say that we’re in some alternate reality. The above SWYP: See What You Print concept created by Artefact is a very Apple-y solution to printers. Perhaps the HP/Canon/Epsons of the world should take note.
Verizon posted a “Data Disclosure” page today revealing the company’s “throttling” plans for high bandwidth customers which is currently defined as:
As of August 2011, the top 5% of data users were using 2 GB or more of data each month.
We found it particularly interesting because it is likely to affect Verizon iPhone customers who purchased their 3G iPhone 4 unlimited plan at launch. The policy went into place on September 15th.
Will I be affected by Network Optimization? Only a small percent of customers will be affected. To be affected, you must be:
A data customer on an unlimited data plan;
Have a 3G Verizon Wireless device (if you have a 4G LTE device you will not be impacted); and
Among the top 5% of data users in a given month.
Then, you will only be affected:
When you are on the 3G network; and
When you are connected to a congested cell site.
If Verizon has 50 million data subscribers (guess:>50% of 95 million subs), that is 2.5 million subscribers.
Interestingly, Verizon is telling customers who are affected to upgrade to a 4G phone. Apple obviously doesn’t (yet?) offer a 4G iPhone so they will be steering iPhone users to other devices.
Reps are being told to offer these as solutions to customers who want to avoid throttling:
Upgrade to a 4G LTE smartphone
Migrate to a usage-based (tiered) data plan
Use WiFi more often
Verizon says this isn’t officially throttling because it is only put in place on congested cell sites. However, those who want truly unlimited plans in the US might want to consider a Sprint iPhone which is highly likely to come in a month or so.
Sony seems to be hampering its PlayStation Vita console right out of the gate according to a report today from Ars. What may have seemed like OK battery life before Apple’s iOS devices came on the scene, now seems downright paltry. Compare the iPad’s 10+ hours of usage to the Vita’s claimed stats, with the screen at the default brightness, Bluetooth turned off, and headphones used for audio:
Game: Approx. 3-5 hours
Video: Approx. 5 hours
Music (in stand-by mode): Approx. 9 hours
Even the diminutive and probably better-compared iPod touch (released a year ago) pretty much destroys that with 40 hours of music playback and 7 hours of video (right).
As for memory, the Vita has none built-in like iOS devices. But Sony (just being Sony) will offer a proprietary memory card format, instead of say just using SD or speedy SDXC cards that are about a buck a Gig. Prices? Expand Expanding Close
Announced on the Skype Blog, Microsoft-owned Skype now integrates with (5% Microsoft-owned) Facebook on Mac. With the update, your Facebook friends will be able to see your online status and Skype you without leaving the Skype application. As per usual with Microsoft applications, the Mac version trails behind the Windows version…and as a bonus, non-paying Skype users will now see ads.
Today we’re launching Skype 5.4 for Mac Beta. The launch introduces the same Facebook integration found in Skype 5.5 for Windows. We are excited to finally deliver Facebook integration to our Mac users.
Just like in our Windows client, you will now be able to IM and connect with your Facebook friends without leaving Skype. You will also be able to read and update your News Feed, as well as comment and ‘Like’ your Facebook friends’ posts – all within Skype for Mac. To connect to Facebook, simply sign into Skype, click on the Connect to Facebook tab and enter your Facebook sign in details.
We are also introducing an advertising platform in this new release, but if you are a paying Skype consumer or have Skype Credit, you won’t see any display ads; similar to the model that is currently being used in our Skype for Windows client.
Unwire.hk (via MacRumors) shows what they indicate may be screen protectors for the new iPhone 5. Interestingly, the screen protectors here show a wide home button (above) and when compared to the current iPhone 4, show a wider screen area (below).
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If the current aspect ratio is preserved, the new size would indicate that the screen extended further toward the top and bottom of the device.
Apple and Sprint have completed work on a version of the iPad for Sprint’s data network. This Sprint compatible iPad appears to be ready for public consumption and will join the family of GSM (AT&T) and Verizon capable Apple tablets before the holidays. With Apple soon launching a Sprint version of the iPhone – which we independently confirmed in June – we suspect that the Sprint iPad will come alongside or soon after that release. The iPhone 5 release is still scheduled for October 7th according to our source (and others), but changes/delays are always possible.
The Sprint version of the iPad is completely separate from the CDMA Verizon model. We can’t confirm that this new iPad will run on Sprint’s powerful 4G WiMAX network, but the question begs to be asked: Why would Apple build a new iPad for Sprint and not use the CDMA iPad that Verizon already carries? A report yesterday from TUAW seemed to imply that a 4G iPad from Sprint would be happening at some point.
What’s perhaps most enticing about the Sprint iPad (besides the possibility of 4G) is that Sprint is a lot more generous with its data plans, perhaps offering iPad users once again a truly unlimited data option.
Clearly, Sprint CEO Dan Hesse knows (whether or not) he’s getting the iPhone in a few weeks. But he’s obviously sworn to secrecy by Apple.
