handset

LG Electronics swung to a loss in the third quarter as its television and handset businesses suffered a sharp decline in sales.

LG reported a third-quarter loss of 414 billion Korean won ($366 million), compared with a year-earlier loss of 8 billion Korean won. Revenue fell 4 percent to 13.4 trillion Korean won ($11.8 billion).

The chief culprits came from the handset and television business. LG's handset business saw declining sales in both its basic phone business, which it has been purposely ratcheting down, as well as its more profitable smartphone business. Unlike other handset manufacturers such … Read more

The battery life of mobile devices could be drastically improved with the help of a "subconscious mode" developed by University of Michigan professor Kang Shin and doctoral student Xinyu Zhang.

Speaking to Science Daily, which first reported yesterday on the technology, dubbed E-MiLi, Shin said that even when a handset is not in use, a device's wireless radio is searching for incoming data just as much as it would when folks are using the device. The result, the professor said, is a drastic reduction in battery life.

To address that issue, E-MiLi leaves the phone in a "subconscious mode" when it's not in use. When in that mode, the device's wireless radio is operating at one-sixteenth of its normal operating speed, and only goes back to full capacity when it's receiving data. According to Shin, E-MiLi is capable of improving battery life in mobile devices by as much as 54 percent, and total energy consumption savings is usually pegged at 44 percent on platforms.… Read more

Microsoft has taken aim at another company in its bid to generate revenue off Android handsets.

This time around, Microsoft has demanded that Samsung pay it $15 for every Android-based smartphone it sells, South Korea's Maeil Business Newspaper is reporting today, citing anonymous industry officials.

Microsoft started targeting Android handset makers last year. At the time, Microsoft claimed that Android's user interface and functionality infringed its patents. In a statement to CNET last year, Microsoft said it planned to ensure that "competitors do not free ride on our innovations."

In addition to those patent-infringement claims, Microsoft … Read more

Taiwan-based news outlet DigiTimes cited "industry sources" Friday in a report that claims cell phone manufacturer HTC will ship 60 million handsets in 2011, triple 2010's number. It's unclear as to whether this refers solely to smartphones or whether this also involves yet-to-be-released tablet devices.

As one of the biggest hardware manufacturers producing Android phones (from the successful Droid line to the discontinued Nexus One), this is a promising sign for the Google-built mobile operating system. HTC is also a big manufacturer of Windows Phone 7 devices, with the Surround on AT&T and the HD7 on T-Mobile.… Read more

Microsoft's new smartphone platform is off to what could be considered a slower start than expected in North America. That's according to The Street, which has released a report saying that the company sold some 40,000 units on its first day on the market.

That number does not come from Microsoft, which has not yet released sales numbers and refused to comment to both The Street and CNET, but rather a source in a market research firm.

Windows Phone 7, which is the follow-up to Microsoft's Windows Mobile 6.5 platform, hit shelves in the U.… Read more

Ad requests and impressions for mobile ad network Millennial Media show a surge for Android devices and the iPad. Meanwhile, Apple overall is maintaining its commanding lead but has slipped a bit lately.

In its August MobileMix report, Millennial Media found that ad requests (the number of times a mobile ad is clicked on) for Android rose 39 percent since July and have shot up 996 percent since January. Ad impressions (the number of times an ad is displayed) for Google's OS rose 7 percent from the prior month to help it capture 26 percent of all smartphone operating … Read more

The mobile phone industry saw its shipments reach 308 million in the second quarter, with Nokia and Samsung still holding the largest chunk of the highly competitive market, according to a report released Thursday by Strategy Analytics.

The 308 million units shipped across the globe represented a 13 percent gain from the 273 million shipped in the same quarter one year earlier, largely driven by low-end 2G handsets in emerging markets and high-end 3G touch screen phones in more mature regions, the report said.

Among the top five major mobile phone players, Nokia remained in first place with a 36.1 percent slice of the market, down from its 37.8 percent share in the year-ago quarter. Samsung came in second with a 20.7 percent stake, up from 19.1 a year ago, while LG's share dipped slightly to 10 percent.

Only Samsung and Research In Motion, which logged a 3.6 percent chunk of the market, saw their shares rise year over year, thanks to strong demand for QWERTY keyboard phones and touchphones, according to Strategy Analytics.

Looking at the specific vendors, Nokia continued to shed market share as it shipped a lower-than-expected 111.1 million handsets in the quarter. Sporting the enhanced Symbian 3 interface, the N8 smartphone should reach customers in time for the European holiday season, helping profit margins over the second half, said the report. But the phone's lack of buzz in the U.S. could dampen its overall global prospects.… Read more

Amid reports that HTC is working hard to bring its Sense user interface to Windows Phone 7 gadgets, there's been at least one reported sighting of just such a phone that lacks Sense.

A tipster has shared with Engadget some details of a "mystery HTC Windows Phone 7 device" that the gadget blog describes as likely a developer build with hardware that's ready to go. But the phone doesn't seem to have a Sense skin atop the Windows Phone 7 OS, according to the report.

Smartphone makers typically tweak the user interface of the handsets … Read more

Nokia expects market conditions to impact its annual and second-quarter financial results, forcing the company to trim its sales outlook.

The handset maker said Wednesday it now anticipates second-quarter sales for its mobile devices and services division will be at the lower end of, or slightly below, its previous forecast of 6.7 billion euros to 7.2 billion euros ($8.2 billion to $8.8 billion). Samsung attributed the revised forecast to lower-than-expected average selling prices and volumes for its mobile phones.

Operating margins for the second quarter will also be at the low end of, or below, the … Read more