Earlier this month at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, we had the chance to take a look at the infamous Powermat. Powermat is a wireless charging system and an aspirant for the hottest gadget of this year. Instead of having a spaghetti of cables for charging your various gadgets, Powermat confines all this mess into one simple and revolutionary mat. All you need to do is place your phone or device on the mat and it begins charging instantly. So how does this wireless charging technology work? Well, the whole system consist out of one mat, that is available in different sizes allowing you to charge up to three devices simultaneously, and a receiver which is attached to your device of choice. The Powermat X1, X2 and X3 will be available in Summer 2010 for a retail price of $29,99, $44.99 and $59,99 retrospectively. The number of the mat, i.e. X# indicates the number of devices that the mat can charge. There are potable as well as home and office mats available which can be used as a very nifty hub.
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Today Gartner published their figures for the past year. In total, the worldwide mobile phone sales to end users totalled 1.211 billion units in 2009, a 0.9 per cent decline from 2008. This is, if you bear in mind the global recession, a decent result.

The fourth quarter of 2009 ended quite positive with a increase of 8.3 percent. In 2009, smartphone sales reached 172.4 million units, a 23.8 per cent increase from 2008. Athough Symbian and Nokia are still market leader, they lost approx two (Nokia) and five per cet compared to the previous year. Also Sony Ericsson’s market share decreased two per cent.

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Fitch Ratings has lowered Nokia’s credit ratings, citing that the Finish market leaders face increased competition within the smartphone market. The global rating agency said that they are concerned with the growth of the smartphone market which has now become highly competitive with the likes of Apple’s iPhone and RIM’s Blackberry. Fitch has cut Nokia’s long-term debt from A to A-, four levels above junk, or non-investment grade. Read the rest of this entry »

Everyone knows Nokia for being the biggest phone manufacturer with the largest market share on the globe. However, in the third quarter of 2009 Apple has overtaken it as the world’s most profitable handset vendor. Strategy Analytics estimates a profit of $1.6 billion in Q3 while Nokia  recorded only $1.1 billion in operating profit. Although Apple have just three phones in their portfolio they pass the Finnish handset-maker.

“With strong volumes, high wholesale prices and tight cost controls, the PC vendor has successfully broken into the mobile phone market in just two years,” said analyst Alex Spektor. Read the rest of this entry »

At the Nokia World in Stuttgart I had the chance to talk with Axel E. Meyer, Head of Explore Design, from Nokia.  He is responsible for all the latest N-Series devices. In the interview we talked about the Nokia N97 (mini), the Apple iPhone and mistakes in the past. He explained the  steps in the design-development, talked about his favourite devices and the step from rubber-boots to a Web 2.0 company. Read the rest of this entry »

Some of you may have noticed that I, Christian Titze, haven’t written an article since March this year. This has several reasons. One reason is that I’m very busy with school these days and so I don’t have much time to write reviews, trial gadgets and write news and tutorials here on Symbian World.
Another major reason is Nokia itself. Read the rest of this entry »

Major mobile phone manufacturers have signed an agreement to standardise charging ports on all data enabled devices sold in Europe. According to Reuters ten major mobile phone manufacturers including Nokia have agreed to the deal backed by the European Commission.

What does this mean? Well for starters it will reduce the waste created from unwanted accessories. If you’re travelling, there will be no need to lug around multiple chargers (as many PMP’s also use micro USB), and struggling to find the right charger at your mates house will be a thing of the past.

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There is less than a month to go until the expected “iphone” beater is due out for release and public demand (or obsession) is so strong that even the chinese have started to chip-in, thats right N97 Clones have already started to appear on eBay and other auction styled websites – so if your planning on buying an N97 for these kind of sites – Be Warned! Read the rest of this entry »

Today I’ll show you how to convert videos for your Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, iPhone or whatever device in just a few steps. It’s easy as nothing, you don’t need to select any bitrates, codes or so. All you need is a little freeware application called XMedia Recode which you can be downloaded for free here.

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Today I came across a new service called Vopium. Vopium reduces the costs of your international calls and international SMS. However, how does it work and is it really useful? Read more to get the answer.

How it works:

Vopium is free, there are no monthly fee, no call set-up charges, no hidden fees. When you make an international call, Vopium re-routes your call as a local call to a Vopium gateway and then via premium global traffic carriers to ensure top-notch voice quality. All you need to pay is your mobile provider for a local call and Vopium for the international add-on.

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