Artificial Photosynthesis Developed

Panasonic said on Monday it has created a new system for artificial photosynthesis that can remove carbon dioxide from the air almost as well as plants do, as part of the company’s entry into an industry-wide trend toward greener tech.

The company said its system uses nitride semiconductors, which are widely used in LEDs (light-emitting diodes) to convert light to energy, and a metal catalyst to convert carbon dioxide and water to formic acid, which is widely used in dyes, leather production and as a preservative.

Carbon dioxide is a major pollutant and considered to be a main cause of the “greenhouse effect,” which most climate scientists believe causes global warming.

Panasonic has struggled with its traditional electronics business and has made eco-friendly products and practices the key element in its turnaround plan. The company is hoping to leverage its large rechargeable battery and solar businesses, while joining the industry in embracing technologies that are friendlier to the environment. The issue is an important one with customers, as demonstrated by the the outcry earlier this month when Apple was forced to rejoin a green standards program when clients complained about its earlier withdrawal.

Panasonic said the system can convert carbon dioxide and water to formic acid with an efficiency of 0.2 percent in laboratory conditions, which is similar to the conversion rate for green plants. The efficiency refers to the portion of the incoming light energy stored in materials produced during the process.

Source…

Sprint Will Support Mozilla’s Mobile OS

A new operating system for mobile phones, similar to the Mozilla Firefox internet browser has got the backing of several major telecom companies, turning up the heat on Google and Apple in the smartphone market.

Mozilla said on Monday that mobile network operators Deutsche Telekom, Sprint, Smart, Telecom Italia, Telenor and Etisalat are backing the Firefox platform.

The non-profit organization which evolved from Netscape after the internet browser wars 14 years ago, said phone makers ZTE and TCL Communication Technology will roll out the first Firefox OS phones using Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processors in early 2013.

Mozilla, which fosters the collective development of open-source Web applications, currently generates most of its income from a contract which makes Google the default search provider for Firefox users.

Broad support from telecom companies and handset makers is crucial for any new smartphone platform to take off in a market increasingly dominated by Google’s Android software, which has a market share of around 60 percent, while Apple’s iPhones run on its proprietary iOS software.

Source…

Windows 7 Most Used OS

Windows 7 is now the leading operating system (OS) for PCs, according to figures from web traffic analysis firm Statcounter.

The report claims that in June more than half of all internet connected PCs, or 50.2 per cent, ran Microsoft’s most recent Windows 7 OS.

Statcounter’s statistics show that Windows XP was the next most popular operating system, used by 29.9 per cent of users.

This might be the first time that Windows 7 has had more market share than the other operating systems put together, but with the launch of Windows 8 looming, it’s only a matter of time before Microsoft will begin pushing Windows 7 users to make the switch to its next operating system.

That’s already started happening with XP. Launched back in 2001, the OS was a massive hit for the software giant and for this reason it’s finding it hard to wean users away from Windows XP – especially considering how rubbish Windows Vista was. However, Microsoft has said that it’s time to move on, and it will end business support for Windows XP in the next two years.

Source…

Nokia And Ford Team Up

Ford has teamed up with Nokia to equip its cloud-connected vehicles with the Finnish phone maker’s Location Platform.

The Nokia Location Platform consists of a suite of client and server-side programming interfaces that allow developers to build interactive applications with maps and map-related services.

The possible integration of the service into Ford vehicles in the future could help Ford learn driver behaviour and control, improve and personalize vehicle performance.

“Another area of Ford’s research is designed to optimise hybrid powertrain efficiency,” Nokia said in a press release. “The Nokia Location Platform could automatically regulate a car’s powertrain as it travels through established or driver-specified ‘Green Zones’.”

Christof Hellmis, VP of the Map Platform in Nokia’s Location and Commerce business unit said the integration of Nokia’s Location Platform is not scheduled for production and has so far only been seen in the Ford Evos concept car.

Source…

T-Mobile To Make More Cuts

T-Mobile USA will eliminate an additional 900 jobs in a restructuring, on top of a 1,900-job reduction at its call centers that was announced in March, the carrier confirmed on Wednesday.

T-Mobile, now with about 36,000 employees, has faced more than two years of subscriber losses. Last year, the wireless carrier lost out on a $39 billion deal to be taken over by AT&T — federal regulators rejected the deal.

In its first quarter results announced May 9, T-Mobile said it lost 510,000 contract customers. It now serves 33.4 million customers.

Not having the iPhone 4S to sell, compared to the other three major U.S. carriers, also hurt T-Mobile and lead to more contract deactivations, the company said in its first-quarter results.

A T-Mobile spokeswoman said in an email that the elimination of 900 jobs was the result of a “restructuring of key functions and departments across the company, including the elimination of some positions and outsourcing of others.”

Source…

Apple Faces Another Lawsuit

Apple devices using touch technology infringe on a patent owned by the Pennsylvanian company FlatWorld Interactives, the company stated in court documents filed on last Friday. FlatWorld asked for a permanent injunction that Apple stop infringing, and for sufficient compensation for the infringements, the company’s attorneys said.

The Pennsylvanian designer of touchscreen systems for use in museum displays alleged that Apple knowingly infringed on its patent, according to documents filed with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California said. The infringing products are said to include the iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, Magic Mouse and Magic Trackpad.

FlatWorld said Apple’s infringement has been on a massive scale and has caused it irreparable harm. The company demanded a permanent injunction enjoining Apple from continued infringement plus an unspecified amount of damages to compensate for Apple’s infringement. The company is seeking a jury trial.

FlatWorld was founded in January 2007 by Slavko Milekic, a professor in cognitive science and digital design at the University of the Arts in Pennsylvania, in order to commercialize his touch screen patent, the filing said.

Milekic filed a provisional patent application on August 28, 1997, claiming priority from that date in his definitive patent application, according to the court documents. He applied for his patent on June 12, 1998 and was granted it as U.S. patent 6,920,619 on July 19 2005, according to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Source…

Cisco Hits 50 Million Milestone For Its IP Phones

Cisco Wednesday announced Wednesday that it has sold its 50 millionth IP phone, a significant increase in just two years when 30 million were sold.

The switching technology giant today also said it will make software for presence, instant messaging and Cisco Jabber IM clients available for free to its Unified Communications Manager customers.

The latter move means organizations with UCM can roll out presence and IM to employees simply and cheaply to smartphones and tablets running various operating systems, Barry O’Sullivan, senior vice president of Cisco’s voice technology group, said in a blog post.

The supported OSs include Windows, Mac, iPad, Cisco Cius, iPhone, BlackBerry and, later in 2012, Android, O’Sullivan said.

The move helps companies “deploy a unified communications client that is BYOD-ready,” he added. BYOD refers to Bring Your Own Device, a trend where companies allow workers to use devices of their choosing to connect to company data wirelessly.

Source…

RIM Goes Non-BlackBerry

Research In Motion on Tuesday launched software that will allow its large “enterprise” customers to manage Apple and other rival devices through the same servers as they use for the BlackBerry smartphone and Playbook tablet.

The new Mobile Fusion software, first announced in November, is an acknowledgement of sorts by RIM of a growing preference by many users inside big corporations and government to access professional communications over their personal devices, often the Apple iPhone or iPad, or devices running Google’s Android.

RIM, which long dominated the so-called enterprise market, has watched the BlackBerry’s market share steadily erode in recent years. Unable to arrest the trend, the company now aims to generate a fresh revenue stream from it. Mobile Fusion will cost $99 per user to license and $4 per user a month, with discounts available for bulk orders.

In a second announcement on Tuesday that highlights RIM’s eroding market position, it said its PlayBook tablet now boasts 15,000 applications – still just a tiny fraction of the number available on the iPad. One of the biggest complaints about RIM’s products is the dearth of content and applications.

A recent survey from Appcelerator and IDC showed less than 16 percent of developers were “very interested” in creating programs for RIM, compared with 90 percent for Apple and 80 percent for Android.

Source…

Is NFC Taking Off?

Analyst working for Berg Insight have noted a growth in global sales of handsets featuring Near Field Communication (NFC) increased ten-fold in 2011.

More than 30 million units were sold in 2011 and the market was growing at a compound annual growth rate of 87.8 percent. It predicts that shipments will reach 700 million units in 2016. The global rise in smartphone adoption is also driving higher attach rates for other wireless connectivity technologies in handsets including GPS, Bluetooth and WLAN, the report said.

Some of the reason for the growth is the reduction in the cost of the technology. It is now a staple feature on high-end smartphones and most medium- and low-end models. Declining costs will also enable broader integration in the featurephone segment that is rapidly gaining smartphone-like functionality.

Shipments of WLAN-enabled handsets have more or less doubled annually in the past four years and the attach rate increased to 33 percent in 2011.

Source…

PayPal Wooing SMB’s With Payments Service

PayPal is focusing on small businesses, service providers, and casual sellers on the move with its new PayPal Here service which allows vendors to process a variety of payments including checks and cards using their mobile phones.

The new service unveiled Thursday includes a free app and encrypted thumb-sized card reader, which allows merchants with an iPhone, and later Android smartphones, to process payments.

Merchants can accept payments by swiping cards in the card reader, scanning cards and checks using their phone cameras, or by entering card information manually into the app, the eBay unit said. They can also send an invoice and set payment terms, and accept PayPal payments from the app. The check facility is however only available in the U.S.

An iPhone version of the card reader and merchant app is available from Thursday to select merchants in the U.S., Canada, Australia and Hong Kong, with general availability in those countries scheduled for April. PayPal also plans to have an Android version of the merchant app by then. It will announce the availability of the service in more countries soon, it said.

Merchants pay a flat rate of 2.7 percent for card swipes and PayPal payments, while checks will be processed free of charge. Scanning of cards or typing the card information will be charged extra. PayPal Here merchants will also receive a business debit card for access to cash and 1 percent cash-back on eligible purchases.

PayPal will be competing with mobile payment systems from other providers such as Square and Intuit.

The key differentiator for PayPal Here in comparison to other small business mobile payment services is that it comes from a trusted brand in the online payments industry, with more than 100 million customers globally, David Marcus, vice president of mobile at PayPal said in a blog post.

« Previous Page — Next Page »