News tagged ‘report’

Citing an anonymous source who worked at Apple, USA Today revealed that 50-inch Apple television is said to be housed in the secure California studio of Jonathan Ive. The same source also said that Apple is looking to build an LCD television sized 42 inches or larger with built-in Wi-Fi functionality, because Apple is not interested in building an HDTV with a screen size of less than 42 inches.

Author Scott Martin notes that Apple's rumored TV set is going to receive "big buzz" at next week's Consumer Electronics Show, even though the Cupertino, Calif., company isn't attending the event.

The story also features a quote from Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, who said he expects Apple will make "an attempt" to build a TV. He believes the living room will "remain a center for family entertainment, and that touches on all areas of consumer products that Apple is already making."

The report offers little else that is new about Apple's anticipated television set. Some reports have indicated that Apple plans to use custom chips, like it does with the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, others suggested that Apple could include AirPlay and iCloud into its new product. Rumors also claim that Apple wants to be able to offer customers customized channel lineups with its anticipated television set to choose whichever channels or shows they want for a monthly subscription fee.

Apple early today updated its investor relations page to officially state that it will report its fiscal first-quarter (fourth calendar quarter of 2011) earnings on Tuesday, Jan. 24, when it will reveal the results of the iPhone 4S launch and holiday shopping season.

Apple’s conference call webcast discussing Q1 - 2012 financial results will begin at 2:00pm PT/5:00pm ET on Tuesday, January 24, 2012.

Please note that comments made during this call may include forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties, and that actual results may differ materially from these forward-looking statements. For more information on the factors that could influence results, please refer to Apple’s SEC filings.

Current expectations on Wall Street call for Apple to report profits of $9.83 billion on revenue of $38.16 billion. A total of 46 analysts polled skew as high as $10.74 billion and as low as $8.88 billion in their predicted revenue. The company is also predicting all-time record iPhone sales as industry sales estimates have been pointing toward a similar record for Mac sales. iPad sales are also expected to be strong with a record number of sales. As for iPod sales, this quarter remains the company's strongest while iPods remain ones of the most popular gifts.

According to the Daily Mail report, Apple wants to bid for rigts to stream English Premier League (PM) games. English Premier League is the England’s top football league and one of the most popular football leagues worldwide and it is expected that bidding for the rights to stream its content will generate billions of dollars for the league and the teams. The league will consider bids for the next football season after the rights to stream games expire at the end of the current season.
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All Things D reported on Monday that Apple is reportedly planning an event scheduled to take place in New York at the end of January. The company is said to use the event as a platform for an advertising or publishing announcement. Of course, many anxiously await the announcement of a much anticipated iPad 3 or new Apple TV, which some think will be launched later in 2012. Apple usually reserves product launches and important announcements for its home-state like the latest iPhone 4S, which debuted on Oct. 4, 2011 at Apple's campus.

According to sources close to the situation, Apple is planning an important — but not large-scale — event to be held in New York at the end of this month that will focus on a media-related announcement.

Per the usual caveat, the tech giant is well known for moving around their public show-and-tells, so this could certainly change at any moment.

Several of Apple's media and advertising units have significant presences in New York City, and Apple Senior Vice President of Internet Software and Services Eddy Cue (Cue is currently heading up the iTunes Store, App Store, iBookstore) is said to take part in the end of the event that has caused rumors suggesting that Apple’s announcement may be connected with advertising or publishing.

Digitimes has reported that Apple will be utilizing IGZO (indium gallium zinc oxide) flat panels instead of IPS (in-plane switching panels) in its "next-generation mobile display products" such as the iPad 3.

Starting with the new iPads, Apple will utilize IGZO panels from Sharp in order to upgrade the display resolution of the new tablets to full HD level, the sources indicated.

Though, such rumors aren’t new ones. We have already heard that Apple could use this technology in the next-generation iPad. A research note from Jefferies analyst Peter Misek back in November made very similar claims:

Also, we believe that Apple and Sharp together have a modified IGZO (indium, gallium, zinc) technology to achieve 330 dpi, which is sufficient for an HD display while not using IPS nor having to include dual-bar LED backlighting. In our view, this should lead to several design advantages, namely the device can be thinner, battery life should be longer, and the overall experience for users should be meaningfully improved.

In April, Sharp revealed its plans to commercialize new IGZO panels for mass production later this year. DisplayBlog recaps the advantages of this new technology:

The benefits of IGZO are plenty: lower cost of manufacturing, up to 30x higher electron mobility than a-Si (amorphous silicon), increased aperture ratio for improved light transmittance, higher resolution in terms of ppi, etc. IGZO would allow for significant cost reductions compared to LTPS (Low Temperature Poly-Silicon).

The new technology is said to allow Apple not to use a second light bar system that is presently used in the iPad and to avoid making the iPad 3 thicker than the current iPad.

Sources in Apple's supply chain told DigiTimes that Apple has begun reducing orders for the iPad 2 ahead of the unveiling of an anticipated third-generation iPad. While iPad 2 orders are being reduced, orders for the next iPad, reportedly set to launch in March of 2012, remain steady. It's not yet known whether Apple will keep the iPad 2 around at a discounted price. There are some rumors claiming that Apple would remain it available at a discounted price in order to take on Amazon's $199 Kindle Fire. It is known that Apple has gained great success in continuing to sell older iPhone models at discounted prices. The iPhone 3GS is still remaining the number 2 smartphone in the United States.

Various reports have suggested that Apple will continue to sell the iPad 2 at a discounted price after it launches a third-generation iPad. Apple already employs that strategy in offering the iPhone 3GS, first released in 2009, as an entry-level handset, in addition to the iPhone 4, released in 2010, and iPhone 4S, which just launched in October.

There are also lots of rumors suggesting that in 2012 Apple plans to introduce new models of the iPad with different features at a number of price points. Many analysts believe that Apple indeed will launch the next-generation iPad with a high-resolution Retina Display.

The BBC reported on Friday that Jonathan Ive, Apple's senior vice president of industrial design, has been named a Knight Commander of the British Empire in the U.K.'s 2012 New Year Honours list for "services to design and enterprise”. In 2005 he was awarded the title of Commander of the British Empire. Ive responded that he was "both humbled and sincerely grateful" by the commendation.

"I am keenly aware that I benefit from a wonderful tradition in the UK of designing and making," he said. "I discovered at an early age that all I've ever wanted to do is design."

Ive’s father was the first who inspired him to study design. Ive went on to study Industrial Design at Newcastle Polytechnic University. It was there that he first realized the potential of designing on the Mac.

"I discovered the Mac and felt I had a connection with the people who were making this product," he said. "I suddenly understood what a company was, or was supposed to be."

After graduating, Ive worked at the U.K. design agency Apple cooperated with. Then the company noted his talent and offered him a full-time position. During his 19 years at Apple, Ive and Steve Jobs became close friends and even "spiritual partners", according to Jobs' biography. While Jobs and Ive were close friends, Ive did admit to Isaacson that he felt Jobs had stolen some of his ideas.

"[Jobs] will go through a process of looking at my ideas and say, 'That's no good. That's not very good. I like that one,'" Ive told Isaacson in an interview. "And later I will be sitting in the audience and he will be talking about it as if it was his idea. I pay maniacal attention to where an idea comes from, and I even keep notebooks filled with my ideas. So it hurts when he takes credit for one of my designs."

Market research company comScore published their latest estimates of market shares taken by the main players on the mobile market. Apple’s share continues to slowly move upward with 11.2 percent of all U.S. Mobile Subscribers.

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Like the controversial face unlock functionality in Google’s Galaxy Nexus, a new Apple’s patent application points out that the company is developing similar but more sofisticated face detection solution. As PatentlyApple reports, Apple said that these user detection system could be included in a future MacBook, iPad, iPod touch and iPhone.
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Digitimes now claims that it has obtained new portion of information on the rumored Apple’s television. The main role in manufacturing and assembling of the new TVs is expected to be played by Foxconn, Apple's primary iOS device manufacturing partner.  The company is likely to win the contract for assembly of the television set products.

Following sources' claims that Samsung Electronics and Sharp will manufacture chips and displays, respectively, for the so-called Apple "iTV," others have suggested that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), Advanced Semiconductor Engineering (ASE) and Siliconware Precision Industries (SPIL) have the potential to win orders for Apple's smart TV.

Foxconn Electronics (Hon Hai Precision Industry) likely will obtain assembly orders for the Apple smart TV, according to industry sources.

We have already reported that Apple is going to finalize Apple’s TV design by the end of the second quarter and launch the television sets by the end of the year. Moreover, the analyst Shaw Wu at Sterne Agee has suggested that Apple may be interested in disrupting the television industry on the content side by launching its own television services which, obviously, will be connected with Siri.

"This is obviously much more complicated (than current offerings) from a licensing standpoint," Wu wrote in a note to investors on Wednesday. "And in our view, would change the game for television and give AAPL a big leg-up against the competition."

Hardware and technology are not the issues holding back Apple from releasing a television set, he said. Instead, Apple must negotiate unique content deals that will allow the company to differentiate its product from other televisions on the market.

There have been many rumours about the iPad 3 which is expected to debut sometime in the beginning of 2012. DigiTimes is one of the main sources for these reports and now it claims that Apple is going to launch its next iPad at the Macworld|iWorld conference that will open on January 26th 2012.

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Apple is expected to build its own chips like in the iPhone and iPad for its anticipated television set, instead of utilizing third parties chips from a company such as Intel.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), Advanced Semiconductor Engineering and Siliconware Precision Industries are three companies expected by DigiTimes to bid on orders with Apple. The companies could build custom ARM-based chips to power an Apple television, much like the A4 CPU, first released in the iPad in 2010, is found in the current Apple TV set-top box.

Earlier this year we reported that Apple signed the agreement on the production of next-generation "A6" and "A7" processors for the iPhone and iPad with TSMC and would utilize its 28nm and 20nm process technologies. It is possible that Apple television set will use the same iPhone and iPad’s chips. The Apple TV is also expected to be assembled by Foxconn Electronics, which is the manufacture of most of Apple’s devices.

Apple will have finalized the hardware standards for its television set by the end of the second quarter of 2012, only after that, the company will begin placing orders for its customized chips. Apple already used such approach to build its iPad and iPhone lineups.

Early this month the rumors suggested that Intel’s next-generation Ivy Bridge processors would launch in May. Theses mobile processors are expected to be used in Mac mini, MacBook Pro and MacBook Air lines.

Now DigiTimes reports that new Ivy Bridge processors may debut in early April, with both desktop and mobile processors launching around the same time.

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Reuters reports that Apple has been fined 900,000 euros, or $1.2 million, in Italy in response to complaints of "unfair commercial practices" related to product warranty disclosures. Apple sold its products with a standard one-year warranty. The customers had an option to buy a second year through AppleCare, but local laws require companies to protect buyers with a free two-year warranty.

According to the report, Italy's antitrust regulators ruled that Apple has not been providing adequate disclosures about the two free years of product warranty assistance required under Italian law that is why Apple was fined 400,000 euros for not providing adequate information to customers about the length of product guarantees, and another 500,000 euros stemmed from Apple not giving customers enough information about its AppleCare extended warranty.

The authority said Apple Sales International, Apple Italia and Apple Retail Italia did not properly inform customers that they were entitled to two years of free assistance under Italian law. Three Apple spokesmen contacted by Reuters weren't immediately available for comment.

Information provided about an extra guarantee scheme, the "AppleCare Protection Plan," encouraged customers to buy the service without clearly explaining that it overlapped with the free assistance required by law, the competition authority said.

The Argentinean government has temporarily blocked sales of certain electronics including Apple's iPhone and RIM's BlackBerry. Such measures were attempted in order to stabilize the country's ailing economy, to slow rising inflation and correct the disparity between the pesos and U.S. dollar, while suggesting that companies must build plants in the country to resume sales.

In order to continue smartphone sales in Argentina, Apple must build a plant or partner with a local company to manufacture the iPhone. RIM is reportedly looking to partner with an existing plant so that it can continue sales in the region. Other handset makers like Motorola, Nokia and Samsung have already moved or built plants in Argentina's Tierra del Fuego free zone after the government passed the Internal Revenue Law of 2009, which added a 20.48 percent tax to the existing 21 percent VAT for certain imported electronic devices.

According to Argentinean site Fortunaweb, iPhone and BlackBerry sales comprised 60 percent of the total market in October. And to strengthen the Argentinean economy, the government made decision to support local manufactures, banning some electronics manufactures from sales in this country. The Economist reported in December article that "a slowing year-to-year GDP blamed on decreased demand for agricultural commodities and huge government subsidies have caused the country to enact tighter controls on capital flight".