News tagged ‘report’

Recently Wall Street Journal reported that Daimler AG's Mercedes-Benz is going to equip its forty dealerships with iPads for more effective selling and leasing cars. The devices will have company's Advantage app installed on. That will enable dealers to have a quick access to the latest rebates and discounts and complete credit applications on the go without the need of leading the customer to a desk with a PC.

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Yesterday Associated Press reported that a 19-year-old Li Hai, who had worked for only 42 days in Foxconn, which is responsible for iPhone manufacturing, jumped from a building and died on Tuesday.

This is a tenth death in a row for a last year among Foxconn workers. This and eight other suicides were commited at Foxconn's plant that situated in the southern city of Shenzhen. That was also the place for two feeble attempts when the workers have survived.

Terry Gou, who is a Foxconn Chairman, told reporters on Monday (beofre the tenth death):

"Foxconn is not running a sweatshop. We are confident we'll be able to stabilize the situation soon."

Last week Southern Weekend reported that employees are signing "voluntary overtime affidavits" to earn more than $132, which is a local minimum wage that a worker can earn through a 36-hour workweek. One of the employees explained:

"Without overtime, you can hardly make a living."

Days later, on Friday a 21-year-old Foxconn employee jumped from a 4-story building.

One of the heart-rending stories reveals a suicide committed in July of 2009, when one of the workers jumped from a 12-story building because he was allegedly responsible for one of the sixteen next-gen prototype iPhones disappearance.

Scoopertino.com had recently posted another "unreal news" report, where it is revealed that Apple made a Flash-compatible version of iPad. It's called iPad XL and made with a support of Honda. Just insert your iPad into the XL's side-mounted pocket and that will make it possible "to run the flashiest and most tasteless Flash sites on earth” as quite as never before - only at 96 decibel.

Full story can be found here.

Recently posted report from Associated Press reveals that a local team of the New York Yankeees, decided to ban the iPad from the world-famous Yankee stadium because of a security and safety issues. MLB Advanced Media Chief Executive Officer Bob Bowman said Business Insider that the real reason is that the Yankees don't want people to get distracted because of iPad and then getting hit with a ball. But IntoMobile notes that people will still have an ability to bring their iPads anyway.

"If you've got a loose-fitting jacket or some monstrous pockets on your blue jeans, you might be able to smuggle the tablet inside”.

It is interesting that the Yankee Stadium is one of the most tech-savvy parks with computer screens in their lockers.

Today Katy Huberty, who is an analyst at Morgan Stanley, revealed a survey for investors that found out interesting forecasts about Apple. It is said that 58$ of all iPhone customers are going to upgrade their mobile device in 2011. In 2008 there were only 18% of them. That means that Apple will sell 18 million more iPhones in 2011. Such a big demand in turn can cause a 50$ drop in prices or $20 in case of service plans costs.

Morgan Stanley also predicted that Apple stock will rise to $310 and even to $400 if Apple is going to be more aggressive in its pricing policy.

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Recently Billboard published a report that reveals new information on Apple's share on music sales market. When the first generation iPhone was presented, iTunes had only 12,7% of American music market. In 2008 Apple almost doubled it and made 21,4%. 2009 reveals five percentage points increase - now iTunes has 26,7% of music sales.

Such mobile providers as AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, and Verizon Wireless on the contrary lose their positions, downing from 6,6% to 4,9% in 2009. Partly it is explained by lower priced ringtones in iTunes and its free tools for making custom ringtones. Both of these factors eventually attracted more people.

Physical media music in turn loses its popularity from year to year. Numbers reveal its share fell from 57,5% in 2008 to 49,3% in 2009. That means that iTunes actually makes a half of all digital music downloads overall.

iTunes' closest rival Amazon also increased its sales. But in digital MP3 sales the company's share grew from 0,8% in 2008 to 1,3% in 2009, which is not even close to Apple's 26,7% share. Such results, according to Billboard, were "still well short of where major labels had hoped Amazon's download store would be by now, dimming earlier expectations that it will be able to significantly reduce the labels' heavy dependence on iTunes for digital sales."

It is interesting to look forward for Google which recently acquired Simplify Media to expectedly turn it into iTunes rival for Android users. But for now the company's subsidiary AdMob reveals the amount of media bought or even downloaded by Android users is still so small that it cannot be compared with iTunes success.

Apple’s iBookstore is beginning to open internationally. It is accessible only on iPads via iBookstore app. Some day the service will be extended to iPhones and iPods.

Several international sites report that Apple's iBookstore is avaliable in several new countries. For the time being, international iBookstore offerings appear limited to free Project Gutenberg titles. Apple is doing its best to sign-up publishers in other markets, while local regulatory and business concerns are slowing the effort in some countries (like the UK).

Some time ago one of the TV-channels in San Francisco, California, broadcasted a news report that highlighted a woman who wanted to purchase an iPad with cash but was denied by Apple representatives in her request. Diane Campbell, who lives on a fixed income and was just saving money for an iPad, became a victim of the company's policy that ensures the device is properly distributed.

Now we received information that Apple had changed its policy and presented her the device for free. The company's senior vice president of retail Ron Johnson told the newscast Apple will stop following credit-only policy.

"It came to our attention that Diane, through your story was very interested in buying an iPad with cash. And we made a decision today to change that."

Two Apple employees came personally to Diane's home to deliver her an iPad for free. Later she talked to the ABC station with an iPad in her hands and said:

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Today Apple released iPhone OS 4.0 beta 4. New firmware is available for download at its developer's center. There is no changelog, but we already have some information about new features in it.

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This Friday Judge Clifford Cretan from San Mateo County in California unsealed the affidavit of the lost iPhone prototype case. Cnet was first who studied the document and concluded that Steve Jobs personally called Gizmodo editor Brian Lam to return iPhone:

"Jobs requested that Lam return the phone to Apple. Lam responded via the e-mail address...that he would return the iPhone on the condition that Apple provided him with a letter stating the iPhone belonged to Apple."

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According to a new report revealed by Silicon Alley Insider on Wednesday iPhone OS 4 may possibly have built-in integration with Facebook.  The feature will probably be presented on June 7 at the annual Worldwide Developers Conference conducted by Apple.

An author of the report Dan Frommer says he doesn't have any details on how it works.

"...We also hear that Apple could be integrating Facebook Connect directly into its software developers kit so programmers can more easily add Facebook 'social' features to their apps".

There is also information about bringing Facebook messaging features to the upcoming versions of iPhone OS making it possible to send messages via Facebook Chat as easy as sending an SMS.

An idea of integration with Facebook was already implemented by Google in its OS Android 2.0. Windows Phone 7 is also expected to support strong Facebook connectivity.

New information received by BusinessWeek from anonymous Apple employee reveals that Steve Jobs began to regularly visit Cupertino's office only in January, 2010, though he returned to work after liver transplant in June 2009.

BusinessWeek sought comments from Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, and he said that he frequently speaks with his friend Steve Jobs and he looks healthy.

"Every time I hear him, he's doing a lot of work and a lot of thinking that's involved in that work, and those things sort of go away if you're very worried about your health".

Jobs announced about his temporary leaving in June 2009. He explained that the reason was about private matter. In September Jobs appeared at Apple's annual music event to present new iPods. It was his first appearance that year and that time he especially underlined his gratitude to a liver donor, who died in a car crash in his mid-20s.

After that Jobs was focused on iPad, and it is reported that he was personally involved in its development.

At this moment he is back at work and experts from Creative Strategies consulting firm say it is good news:

"Except for the fact that he's lost a lot of weight, he's the Steve Jobs of old. At the visionary level, technology and design level, he seems to be working at the same level he was before he was sick."

Recently The Wall Street Journal had reported that Verizon collaborates with Google to create new tablet device that will compete with the iPad. The information was confirmed by Lowell McAdam, who is a Verizon CEO, in his interview to the paper.

"What do we think the next big wave of opportunities are? We're working on tablets together, for example. We're looking at all the things Google has in its archives that we could put on a tablet to make it a great experience."

Still there were no information revealed about the device's hardware and its manufacturers. McAdam said that collaboration with Google has already led to success in company's efforts to combat the iPhone with Android-based handsets, so he's looking forward for the same result in creating new tablet device.

Verizon CEO also told that the company now will close the gap with AT&T which offers exclusive only 3G data plans for the iPad in the USA. In early 2011 Verizon will present 4G-capable device along with its new high-speed network, which by the end of 2010 will cover 25 to 30 cities. It is planned that there will be more price plans for every selling device, and it may be more expensive than current offers of other carriers who have 3G network.

AT&T seems to not support such policy (at least the company have been repeatedly denying such information), though its CEO Randall Stephenson thinks the industry will be proposing variable pricing once.

"For the industry, we will progressively move towards more of what I call variable pricing. The heavy consumers will pay different than the lower consumers."

Yesterday we posted information about smartphone sales in the last quarter 2010, and as you remember Android-based phones become more popular than iPhones. Now it became known that Apple's spokespeople commented on this data.

In its research NPD group studied over 150,000 completed surveys, that were undertaken online every month in America. Apple's representative Natalie Harrison thinks it is not enough data to make precise conclusions:

"This is a very limited report on 150,000 U.S. consumers responding to an online survey and does not account for the more than 85 million iPhone and iPod touch customers worldwide."

It is unknown why Harrison mentioned iPod touch when discussion was about smartphones market, but according to Reunters last week Harrison had referred to the IDC research. The latter also reveals that Apple losing its positions, but this time worldwide, with Nokia and BlackBerry sales ahead in first and second spots respectively.

NPD Group had recently revealed their new study, which shows that iPhone OS became the second most selling OS last quarter in US. To be precise 28% of all handsets sold were Android phones, and iPhones made only 21%. Research In Motion's Blackberries hold 36 percent of market.

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