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Big Win for Android in the Smartphone War

James Oliver — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 11:04:15 +0000

Today Google scored a big win in the ongoing Smartphone war. The Open Handset Alliance, the consortium of companies led by Google that developed the mobile phone operating system, Android, announced that they were adding fourteen new members to their number.

The list of the new 14 reads like a ‘who’s who’ of mobile and technology players. The biggest names involved are Telco Vodafone and Sony Ericsson, though all 14 are major players – the number includes Toshiba Corp and Garmin international.

This is very bad news for Nokia and Microsoft, who make rival operating systems, Symbian and Windows Mobile Software, since it all but guarantees more Android phones. In fact, Ericsson has already announced that it plans to release an Android based device in 2009. It aslo amounts to a rejection of their software by the 14 big industry players.

It’s not hard to see why these companies are clamouring to join Google’s collective. The first Android phone, the G1, is selling very well and is expected to reach the 500’000 phones sold mark this year, despite only being on the market since Autumn. Another plus is that phones made with the Android operating system are also much cheaper, which can help to maximise a company’s profit.

Blackberry launch their answer to the iPhone

Admin — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 11:46:48 +0000

With the popularity of the iPhone and the G1 Android phone on the rise, Blackberry has released its long expected answer, Blackberry Storm. Storm is a device that allows users to do more social things like listen to music, access MySpace or Facebook, and take photos. The device has one big innovation, in what the company refer to as a ‘clickable touch-screen,’ a screen that compresses when you tap it, in order to mimic the feeling of a real keyboard.

The Storm is being widely perceived as an attempt to move into the consumer market that to this point RIM, the makers of the Blackberry have pretty much ignored. The company launched its first mainstream TV campaign this year and seem intent on building market share in the face of unprecedented competition.

Despite impressive sales figures for the iPhone, Blackberry have little immediate cause to be worried. They still dominate the work market by a long way, with a huge number of businesses supplying their employees with Blackberrys to increase productivity and enable them to work remotely.

However, in the fast moving SmartPhone market it’s not a good idea to stand still, RIM are doing the right thing by expanding, especially considering early reports of the iPhone being adopted as a business tool by a small but influential group of companies.

G1 is cheaper to make than the iPhone

Matt Thomas — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 10:00:26 +0000

It would appear that the T-Mobile G1 has suffered a slight PR hit. Despite retailing at twice the price of the basic model iPhone, ($399 as opposed to $199) DowJones, CNN, and iSuppli have uncovered the shocking fact that the G1 is actually 10 per cent cheaper to make.

This all begs the question, why do T-Mobile feel they can charge so much for the phone? Many have pointed to the three megapixel camera that the G1 boasts as well as the keypad, though iphone users can easily counter that by pointing out the huge dearth of internal memory in the G1 has compared to the iPhone (1GB removable as opposed to 16GB internal).

Some of it is likely to be novelty factor. Remember, the GI has been on the market for not even two months. The Android operating system will also have something to do with it, apple didn’t have to write a new system from scratch for the iPhone and maybe some of those costs are being passed on to T-Mobile by Google. Either way, like all electronics, I’d expect the price of the G1 to eventually fall bringing it more in line with the iPhone.

Google fixes Android security flaw

Matt Thomas — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 12:04:33 +0000

Remember a week or so ago I wrote about a flaw in Google’s Android operating system that could compromise the security of users. Well, in the interest of fairness to Google, I should report that the flaw has been fixed with an update available to all users imminently.

The issue has been a test of how quickly and efficiency the company can react to things like this and they appear to have passed. Though the way that the issue came to light in the first place will leave a sour taste with Google, after a private security firm, Independent Security Evaluators, not only discovered the glitch, but gave the information to the press.

This has led Google to call for “Responsible disclosure.” What it means by that is, if a private user or company should discover a security glitch with Android, they should give Google a reasonable amount of time to fix the problem before they go public.

Google says that this is so unscrupulous users have less time to exploit a glitch once they are made aware of it. You would however, be forgiven for thinking that it’s actually an attempt to reduce the amount of embarrassment and PR damage that Google, who are constantly competing with the likes of the Iphone and the BlackBerry, suffer.

Security issues with Android

Matt Thomas — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 10:00:04 +0000

It’s not even been a week since the release of the T-Mobile G1 Android phone, but Security professionals are already calling its security into question. Reportedly, there is a serious issue with the Android operating system that could leave it open to ‘drive by’ attacks from hackers.

Security experts at ISE, a Baltimore based security company posted a warning about the flaw which, they claim, could lead to G1 mobile phones being compromised if they accessed a malicious site. “These phones may pose a security risk to their users until an update becomes available,” said the posting.

Once a phone is infected, hackers have access to everything, including cookies, which means passwords, bank account information, addresses and all kinds of other personal information.

ISE say that they have reliable exploit code for the Android system but will keep this firmly under wraps and wait for the issue to be resolved, maintaining that there is no exploit available to the general populace, at least not one they know of.

Thankfully, ISE are currently working with the Android team at Google to resolve the issue. However, personnel at Google are said to be unhappy with the company for going public before a fix was available, after they had specifically asked them not to.

First day on the market for the G1 Android Phone

Matt Thomas — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 11:08:24 +0000

In the early hours of this morning (our time) a little piece of tech history was made when the T-Mobile G1 went on sale in a San Francisco T-Mobile store. The G1 is the first mobile phone to use the Android platform devised by Google and its partners to revolutionise mobile phone handsets and what they can do.

The launch attracted the proverbial queue of people outside the store, about 150 all told. This group of dedicated gadget fans was headed by Christopher Laddish, a student who had started queuing at eight o’clock that morning (the phones eventually went on sale at 6 in the evening) stating, “I was sold on it without even having to pick it up.” He received a T-Mobile tee-shirt for his efforts.

Predictably the Android phone is inviting comparisons with Apple’s iphone, which is thought to be propping up Apple’s share price at the moment. This strong competition will come at precisely the wrong time for the computer giant, who will be hoping that the initial interest in the G1 is merely a flash in the pan.

The G1 is currently retailing at $180 dollars with a service agreement and $400 dollars without.

Pre-orders of Android Phone hit 1.5 million

Matt Thomas — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 10:28:00 +0000

The T-Mobile G1, the world’s first phone based on the Android mobile operating platform is creating something of a word of mouth storm. There’s still a week to go before the device is actually available but pre-orders of 1.5 million have been reported already.

There’s enough of a buzz around the phone to predict with some confidence that, initially at least, the phone should provide strong competition for both the iPhone and the Blackberry. Whether the initial buzz will be maintained once people have a chance to actually use it is another matter, though the omens look decidedly good.

The Android phone is unique in that it operates on a completely new platform, Android, which has been designed specifically with this purpose in mind by Google and the Mobile Handset Alliance – a collection of top technology companies. Access to Android has been pretty open since its birth with several software development kits being released at various stages of the platform’s development. The software is also going to be completely open source, in an effort to further encourage innovation on the part of developers.

So far the strategy appears to be working, with over 1,700 new applications ready to go. Considering the phone isn’t even out yet, this is a staggering amount and may well have something to do with the amount of pre orders.

T-Mobile to release the world’s first Android Phone

Matt Thomas — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 11:38:02 +0000

T-Mobile have today announced that they will be releasing the world’s first Android-powered phone, the T-Mobile G1. The G1 will be the first phone ever to use the Android platform – an operating system designed specifically for mobile phone handsets.

This is a huge moment in the brief history of Android, coming less than a year on from an announcement by the Open Handset Alliance – a group of thirty or so mobile and technology companies – that they would seek to create a custom designed mobile platform to enable the creation of new and advanced mobile applications.

The team behind Android are keen for developers to begin designing applications for the system, and so, have released several software development kits (SDKs) over the past year, culminating in the release of Android 1.0 SDK R1, today.

As part of the Android Developer Challenge, a scheme that offers $10 million dollars worth of awards to developers using the Android platform, over 1,700 applications have been designed so far and established names like Google are developing Android versions of many of their products.

The Open Handset Alliance’s enthusiasm for innovation doesn’t stop there, however. In an effort to further encourage developers they will be making the entire Android platform open source by the end of the year, allowing anyone and everyone to use the technology as they like.

Erick Tseng, Lead Product Manager of the Android Team calls the platform, “another step towards realizing the full potential of the mobile phone.” It’s hard to disagree with him.