Results tagged “mobile”

On your marks! Get set! Whoooa.. So close yet so far. The eager beavers at Reuters got us all excited earlier today reporting that China Unicom had finally inked the deal to bring the iPhone to China. They went so far as to report that the device would cost Unicom RMB3,000 per phone, a price they will hopefully pass on to the consumer which would make it RMB1,000 cheaper than the smuggled US models sold at Metro City.

The words "unconfirmed", "anonymous" and "sketchy" all come to mind whenever we talk about the arrival of the iPhone to China, but this latest story actually originates from Foxconn, the contract manufacturer for Apple's game-changing phone. JLM Pacific Epoch reports that an unnamed source within the company has leaked that they have already commenced mass production of wifi-less versions of the iPhone for release in this country.

If you are waiting anxiously for the upcoming iPhone 3.0 firmware update - due to be released tomorrow - but concerned that it will relock your iPhone, you need not fear (too much). @MuscleNerd from the iPhone Dev Team announced on twitter that he would be airing a demo of an unlocked iPhone running on the new software.

   

If you've been in Shanghai for long enough you will notice that China Mobile generally has a great deal of outdoor advertising, from billboards to those annoying little screens mounted on the headrest of taxis. As we are draw close to having the conveniences of high speed internet in the palm of our hands, China Mobile has reverted to an older form of advertising on East Nanjing Road.

Here we have it: the most ostentatious religious-themed cellphone in China!

As "G-Day" approaches and suburban Beijing start to get their 3G signal, we are still speculating about the arrival of the iPhone. Rather than relying on official announcements, pundits are now looking further up the iPhone supply chain to make predictions about how and who will bring the iPhone to China.

Kaiser Kuo of Youku Buzz writes:

Here’s a short video of a download speed test of China Telecom’s trial 3G wireless network, which is on the CDMA 2000 1x EV-DO standard. (We usually hear about China Mobile’s TD-SCDMA network, foisted on them by regulators against their wishes, and the “European” standard WCDMA network that will be operated by China Netcom).

Continue reading "China Telecom's 3G to be faster than your ADSL at home?"

While China lags behind the rest of the world in launching it's 3G service, ChinaTechNews.com have reported from an inside source that China Mobile is already gearing up for a 4G service to be ready by World Expo in 2010.

Even with China Unicom basically confirming that they are absolutely talking with Apple, the future of the iPhone in China is still anyone's guess. That's because the company from Cupertino has two choices for who it should throw its precious little moneymaker into.

Looks like the folk at Meizu have been listening to iPhone owners who are annoyed that their device won't support 3G with China Mobile and China Telecom.

As it turns out, China's 3G licenses will be issued to China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom by Spring Festival. Guangdong Mobile (a China Mobile subsidiary) is already releasing a new set of 3G numbers all starting with "188" beginning this Thursday. In addition GPRS fees will be cut by as much as 2/3 in most cities. According to Pacific Epoch, Shanghai Mobile users can "now pay RMB 5 per month for 30MB, rather than the RMB 5, 10 MB package originally available, while RMB 20 per month gets 150MB, also three times more than before".

A nameless source in the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has leaked the news that the three restructured mobile telecommunications carriers, China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom, will be issued licenses on the same day after a meeting with the State Council today.

   

Advertising Agency: O&M Beijing, China

If you have a US iPhone 3G and have been tempted by repeated reminders in iTunes to upgrade to the 2.2 version of the iPhone firmware, you may soon be able to give in to the temptation without fear of relocking your device to AT&T. The iPhone Dev Team has announced that they will be launching a software hack to unlock your 3G iPhone on New Year's Eve. This will allow you to upgrade your firmware and keep it unlocked for use in China or anywhere else with a GSM network for that matter.

With Christmas right around the corner, many of you will be looking for gifts for that special princess (or queen) in your life.

2009 is shaping up to be a very interesting year for China's mobile market. All that excitement over Google's Android phone is finally making its way to China. On the right you see a sleek new gadget codenamed "OPhone" that is making its rounds on gadget forums lately. Said to be a joint effort between Lenovo and China Mobile, this is the first in a series of phones that will be "based on China Mobile's OMS (Open Mobile System) which is essentially Android + TD SCDMA (China's home-grown 3G standard)." ITProPortal says the phone is expected to debut sometime in February or March.

Finally after much hype and news, the Meizu M8 is due for release on December 8th. The guys from PC Online have had the chance to test it against the iPod Touch (because iPhones are not legally available in China yet).

Plans are in motion for the much anticipated launch of an Android device for China between February and March 2009, but unlike the US launch of the T-Mobile G1 handset, China Mobile has decided not to work with Taiwanese PDA manufacturer HTC and has instead opted for working with Lenovo Mobile to release it's first Google powered phone.

• Last week Baidu announced after two years of searching the appointment of Li Yinan as the new Chief Technology Officer for China's leading search engine. Just when everything began to fall into place and we were getting ready for a season Googlesque innovation, rumours began to fly that William I. Chang, Baidu's Chief Scientific Officer was planning to resign because he didn't like his new job scope. Not sure though how much of a rumour it is when they have already named his successor.
• To make CEO Robin Li's life even more stressful, Baidu's next big push will be into the e-commerce arena with the launch of youa.com may be thwarted by Alibaba Group's announcement that it will invest another RMB5 billion into its own online Taobao.com to strengthen its 57% market share. Of course Alibaba claims that this had nothing to do with fending off Baidu and we of course believe them.
• In its own corporate reshuffle, Alibaba has for the first time in its five year history appointed a COO. Zhang Yong, former CFO was promoted to fill the void left by Huang Ruo, the former VP and B2C business director who resigned at the end of September.

Rumours have already started circulating that China Mobile will be the carrier to introduce the HTC G1 Android phone to China. Launched last Tuesday by T-Mobile in the States, this phone is the first device to run on the Google develop platform Android.

The imminent arrival of the the much coveted Apple iPhone to China has brought with it many challenges. Many tech pundits have been speculating if Apple will create a iPhone specifically for China given that China Mobile, the carrier that will carry the phone, will use the locally developed 3G standard TD-SCDMA. iPhones around the world currently support the more widely accepted W-CDMA standard which will be adopted by rival 3G mobile carrier, China Unicom.

Tech super blog TechCrunch tells us of a rumour swirling around that China Mobile will be "offering the iPhone at a heavily subsidized discount in order to court the massive Chinese population". An article at it.hexun.com which cites a member of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) as its source says:

China Mobile will procure the handsets for their full price, and then on-sell subsidized handsets to consumers. The source explained that China Mobile could buy a 3G iPhone from Apple for USD 299 – an example price – and then sell the handset to users for USD 199, treating the additional USD 100 as compensation to Apple. [Translation by Marbridge Consulting]

From Beijing-based techie Frank Yu: "iPhones for sale in Beijing. 1st Gen 8 gig iPhone USD 735. 2nd Gen 8 gig 3G iPhone USD 1,176. The Older iPhones rose almost 42% since 3G." [Source]

The tale of the Apple Computer Corporation in China has been a story of false starts, misadventure and curious competition. Like the all seeing eye of Mordor peering at China from the 3G enabled land of Hong Kong, Apple has sent its minions into the mainland many a time before but never with the success that they have enjoyed in markets like the USA. Even with success in Hong Kong and the rest of the world, the battle to put iPhones into the hands of Chinese consumer will be a tough one.

"A top aide to Gordon Brown has been a suspected victim of a “honeytrap” operation by Chinese intelligence agents. The aide, a senior Downing Street adviser who was with the prime minister on a trip to China earlier this year, had his BlackBerry phone stolen after being picked up by a Chinese woman who had approached him in a Shanghai hotel disco. The aide agreed to return to his hotel with the woman. He reported the BlackBerry missing the next morning. The aide, whose identity is known to The Sunday Times, immediately reported the theft to the prime minister’s Special Branch protection team and was informally reprimanded." [Source]

From Gizmodo:

Meizu will finally release the iPhone-wannabe M8 in August, according to a cryptic message board post by CEO Jack Wong. The first version will have 128MB RAM and an unspecified amount of storage, and a second version should ship in October with 256MB RAM and 8GB on-board flash. The funniest part? The M8 will cost around $320, or $120 more than the AT&T subsidized 8GB iPhone 3G here in the US of A. Luckily for them (and us) this probably won't see its way outside of China.

We already knew that Chinese blogs were some of the main free speech forums in the country, but another form of electronic communication is getting recognized as an opportunity for uncensored commentary: text messaging. A recent NPR piece says texting is popular in China not only because it is relatively inexpensive, but also because it is out of the range of government censorship, at least for now. In a culture that is traditionally emotionally reserved, texting can also be an easier way to express intimate feelings without all the awkwardness of live personal interaction. Whereas courtship-via-text might be frowned upon in Europe or the U.S., it's all part of the dating ritual here in China, from the earliest flirtations to the eventual heartbreak. Alvin Graylin, the CEO of mInfo (which owns Guanxi), a Shanghai-based phone accessory company, explains:

"Chinese are a little more indirect. They don't like to always say what they really mean," says Graylin. "It's easier to sometimes communicate through a short message, a small communication of what you're looking for, than to call somebody and have to explain everything."

When Wong Lei's boyfriend broke up with her, he did it via text message.

Continue reading "From personal commentary to political criticism — the art of the Chinese text message"

A survey conducted online by Sohu shows that to the Internet netizenry (at least those who took part in the survey) thinks, in regards to the telco reshuffle:

A Chinese man is hoping to get in the record books after creating what he claims is the world's largest working mobile phone.

Continue reading "Chinese man builds world's largest cell phone"

As the Financial Times reported, April 1 was the day that China Mobile started trials of its homegrown 3G wireless technology in eight major cities, with about 60,000 customers.