Bloomberg says Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha is out, Google's Dennis Woodside in

When Google announced its purchase of Motorola Mobility, the cell phone and tablet portion of the company, in August of last year no one quite knew exactly what they had planned for the originator of the RAZR and more recently the OG Droid, which helped popularize the Android platform. It was made clear that the purchase was largely a means of attaining pertinent Intellectual Property rights held by the company in order to have some ammunition to use against patent attacks from Apple, Microsoft and others. It was also assumed that at least some jobs at Motorola would be lost through the process, as they often do during mergers and acquisitions.

That premonition came true in October 2011 when Motorola announced the termination of 800 jobs worldwide, as a cost saving effort in departments that Google considered to have redundancies. Bloomberg reported yesterday that the next step in the process is underway, claiming that multiple sources familiar with the matter are stating that current Senior Vice President of Google Dennis Woodside would be replacing Sanjay Jha as Motorola Mobility CEO. While we haven't heard official word Motorola or Google regarding the intended roster change, it is expected that over the next few months more information about Google's part in Motorola's operations will come to light.

Source: Bloomberg
Via: The Verge

T-Mobile USA to launch LTE in 2013

In an earnings report last night, Deutsch Telekom made it clear that they have developed a new approach for how to go forward with T-Mobile USA. The German parent company of T-Mobile officially unveiled its plans to begin development of an LTE network on AWS spectrum beginning in 2013. This will come as the second punch of a two-move combo, beginning with a strengthening of HSPA+ markets with 37,000 new cell sites, utilizing its PCS (1900) spectrum holdings.

Deutsch Telekom is very up front about that fact that it is the AWS spectrum it received after the unsuccessful acquisition by AT&T that will allow them to being deploying Long Term Evolution, which has been widely accepted as the standard for next generation wireless networks around the world. They explain that “the spectrum gained through the breakup fee empowers T-Mobile USA to start LTE-based services in key US markets.”

It makes perfect sense that the spectrum from the breakup fee is more important that the $3 billion in cash they received, as analysts calculated that the money would only allow them to cover operating expenses for 12 to 24 months, and that a different solution would need to be found.

It now becomes apparent the Deustch Telekom was protecting its own interests in urging the FCC to block the Verizon Wireless AWS spectrum purchases from the cable consortium. If so much AWS spectrum is controlled by Verizon, T-Mobile USA will have a very difficult time accumulating what it will need to build out its LTE network into new markets once launched.

I would really like to see T-Mobile get access to some of the AWS spectrum stockpiled by the cable companies. I think it can only do the consumer and the entire US wireless market good to allow a fourth carrier to come in and be competitive with Verizon, AT&T and Sprint, as more consumer choice forces the carriers to be more innovative and try to compete on price coupled with quality of service.

Source: BusinessWire
Via: AllThingsD

T-Mo says No-No to Verizon spectrum purchase

Late last night T-Mobile USA filed with the FCC in an attempt to block Verizon Wireless from acquiring spectrum from Comcast, Time Warner, Bright House, and Cox Communications. T-mobile is arguing that if allowed the transfer would allot an “excessive concentration” of the wireless spectrum in the US to Big Red, who already has a considerable amount of spectrum holdings. The purchase of $3.9 billion of unused AWS spectrum held by SpectrumCo, a joint venture of the aforementioned cable companies, was announced in December of 2011.

It is interesting to see T-Mobile putting up a fight over spectrum consolidation when just last year they were a part of an attempted merger with the nation’s #2 carrier, AT&T. If not pushed into withdrawal by antitrust regulators from the Justice Department, that acquisition would also have consolidated a large portion of wireless spectrum under a single carrier’s control.

This flipflopping may signal a change of approach by Deutsche Telekom, the parent company of T-Mobile USA, who had seemingly no interest in holding onto Big Pink and were more than willing to sell off to AT&T for the agreed upon $39 billion back in March of 2011. They received $3 billion in cash and stock from AT&T (in addition to $1 billion in spectrum) as a part of the agreement when the acquisition failed. Originally they stated that “there is no plan B” for operating the carrier here in the States, and it was widely rumored that they would attempt to find another buyer to take T-Mobile USA off their hands. However, their recent attentiveness to the US wireless spectrum situation with regards to the Verizion purchase could indicate that they’re going to do what many people would argue they should have done from the beginning: innovate and strive to be profitable instead of rolling over and accepting its “fate” as AT&T’s $40 billion lunch.

Source: The Associated Press (Greenville Online)
Via: PhoneScoop

Adobe roadmap says Flash lives! Focus on browser gaming

Thought Flash was gone forever? Adobe wants you to think again.

While they announced the halted development of the Flash plugin for all mobile platforms in Q4 of last year, Adobe clearly still has plans for everyones’ favorite/least favorite multimedia platform, as made evident by the roadmap released today. The PDF that showed up on Twitter early this morning gives a much clearer picture of where Adobe is going to continue to develop and support Flash.

They are planning to narrow focus to two priority areas: what they are calling “premium video” and gaming. The latter is targeted for using Flash as a browser-based gaming solution, where it has already dominated for years. As far as the former, Adobe says they want to collaborate better with their partners in order to bring native video streaming and content protection technology to more platforms.

The roadmap lays out a fairly aggressive intended release cycle beginning with Flash Player 11.2 in Q1 of this year and continuing with a Q2 release and more in the second half of the year. Additionally, it goes on to discuss what they call Flash Next which is said to “ensure that the Flash runtimes meet the needs of developers over the next five to 10 years.” Does that sound like a dead platform to any of you?

Source: Adobe (PDF)
Via: Steve Troughton-Smith (Twitter)

Qualcomm Gobi Generation Five: the Mr. Fantastic of cellular chipsets

Earlier today Qualcomm announced the newest version of its Gobi line of chipsets. Gobi chipsets were originally used mostly to embed a multi-carrier mobile broadband into laptops and was first widely utilized by HP starting in 2008 when the first version was released. It was more recently (and much more widely) used as the cell architecture for every iPhone since the Verizon iPhone 4.

What new features has Qualcomm brought to the table for their latest iteration? Most importantly: LTE support.

The fifth-gen Gobi chipsets will support a number of different LTE configurations, while retaining backwards compatibility with HSPA+ and EV-DO. This means that the newest additions to the Gobi family will be even more flexible then their predecessors, allowing for a device with a single cellular chipset to access “true 4G” and 3G networks all over the world.

It also adds integrated GPS capability, and is said to specifically “support leading platforms, such as Windows 8 and Android”.

This is extremely exciting for anyone who uses unlocked devices, or is “turned on” by the idea of being able to carrier hop with a single device and still get 4G data access. I mentioned the potential for such a chipset back in July in my editorial discussing my version of a US wireless market Utopia and how close (or far) we are from it. I’m really happy to see Qualcomm continue to develop the Gobi reference platform as I continue to think that hardware advances like this will move us in the right direction. Granted, there are still a lot of steps carriers can take to prevent carrier-agnostic devices from becoming the norm. Nevertheless, here’s to hoping that future Google Nexi, Apple iPhones, Motorola Droids and Samsung Galaxies will be able to float from carrier to carrier much easier than this sentence can float off your tongue right now.

Source: Qualcomm
Via: 9to5mac

Leaked slide reveals the HP Pre3 may be even later than you thought

Early this week PreCentral made available several leaked HP slides which illustrate what the webOS roadmap for the remainder of 2011 may look like. While the intended release of 64GB and 4G models of the Touchpad in August are not overly unexpected, it is the appearance of the Pre3 under the Fall release category which concerns me. When HP’s next attempt at breaking into the smartphone market was announced back in early February, my overall impression was that the tech community was quite excited for it. That announcement was shared with their equally as exciting attempt at the tablet market with the Touchpad, and the questionable inclusion of the HP Veer, “the world’s smallest 4G phone”.

Off contract prices drop, we move a step closer towards wireless Utopia, kind of

Several months ago, just a short while after the HTC Thunderbolt launched on Verizon for $249 with 2 year contract or $749 outright, the retail price was silently dropped down to $569, and a number of other devices saw their non-contract price magically drop as well. I was paying close attention to pricing because I recognized that a consumer could upgrade and cancel for less than the original cost of the phone outright ($249 upgrade price + $350 ETF = $599 total < $749 off-contract). However, the corresponding drop of other retail prices created the opposite effect, which is exactly what I was hoping to see happen.

Now that the prices on many of the 3G smartphones are below $500 (see HTC Incredible 2 @ $469, HTC Trophy @ $429, Sony Ericsson Xperia Play @ $449 & Motorola Droid X2 @ $449, etc) we are closer than I can remember to an environment where it can be in the consumer’s best interest to ignore the subsidies offered by carriers and purchase hardware direct from the manufacturer without getting locked into a contract. This is a small but crucial step toward a more ideal wireless market.

The next Google Nexus device rumored - we have some questions

Boy Genius Report recently reported some new details rumoring what the next Google Nexus device might include. Several of the things listed we find to be entirely reasonable to expect for a phone rumored for launch around Thanksgiving, while some others we are more skeptical about. A next-generation dual-processor between the 1.2GHz and 1.5GHz clock speeds seems to line up sensibly with when we’d expect these types of chips to be readily available to manufacturers. The source indicated to BGR that an OMAP 4460 or a successor to the current Qualcomm Snapdragon dual-core chips are likely to be the choices for the silicon on board, the latter being backed up by Google’s choice with the original Snapdragon in the Nexus One back in early 2010.

Other listed specs that we find to be reasonable are the inclusion of 1GB of RAM (which we have already seen on several devices: HTC EVO 3D and Motorola Atrix), Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) as this would be the device to showcase the new version of the OS, and a 5 MP camera with the ability to capture 1080p video.

Welcome to Tech-almagest: What you need to know

In this first post I want to simply explain what we're doing here, what you can come to expect from us and from the site, and what we expect from you.

First and foremost were are here to inform our readers. This is a place where you can come to read long-form analysis of what is happening in the tech industry. There are already tons of sites out there where a person can go to find regurgitated tech stories from the day, and we aren't looking to be another one of them. When we post news it will be because we feel that it is important for one reason or another, and we will provide insight into why we think the story is noteworthy. Much of the content coming from this site will be in editorial form, exploring a topic in a more in-depth fasion and focusing on how the tech of today can allow us to predict what the tech of tomorrow will be like.

We will also be reviewing devices that we can get our hands on, but we aim to limit those reviews to devices that we feel are important to the industry rather than simply trying to cover every new phone, laptop, and camera that comes out.

I am a strong believer that the internet can be a place for discussion and learning through the ideas of our peers. We hope that you will read what we have to say and comment, and that this site will draw in the type of commentors that take time to read the post in full and respond to it when they have meaningful thoughts about the topic. Whether you agree, disagree, or think that we missed something, we invite you to share it. I have always appreciated the insightful commentary that can be found in comment sections, chat rooms, and forums around the net, and I look forward to seeing what I can learn from our readers.

We are aiming to have a feature highlighting what we believe to the most worthwhile comment made by a reader during a given week, as a way of rewarding those of you who take the time to share your thoughts. Right now we are just two, so we are also going to be on the lookout for other contributors and potentially comment moderators if the need arrises.

Please be aware that commenting is not a right but a privledge. If you abuse it, we reserve the right to delete inappropriate comments at our sole discretion. We will never censor someone for disagreeing with us, but we may remove comments that we feel do not promote a continued discussion, use language/terminology that we deem unacceptable, or any other form of spamming/trolling. Comments with images or links will need to be approved by a moderator before appearing on the post.

That's pretty much it. Welcome, and we look forward to hearing from you.

Sony Ericsson to allow bootloader unlocking for Xperia phones, leaving door open for Android hackers

In an unexpected and somewhat uncharacteristic move, Sony Ericsson launched its new site this week for unlocking the bootloader on select Android phones coming out this year and into the future. Owners of the 2011 Xperia line of smartphones (Play, arc, neo, and pro) can follow instructions detailing how they can unlock their bootloaders and enable loading of custom ROMs. While SE goes on to explain that some SIM-locked devices won’t be compatible, and doesn’t skimp on the warnings about the possible negative impacts of using the software to unlock, we can’t help but applaud them for being so hacker-friendly.

Sony Ericsson is the first of the major Android manufacturers to make handsets and openly aid in enabling the ability to load custom ROMs (Google developer devices notwithstanding), and so the line has been added to the select group of ‘Root-Friendly’ devices collected by development team Unrevoked. HTC had been known as one of the least-combative manufacturers to the efforts of the Android-modding community, but recently have begun to lock devices down to a greater extent. Our impression is that this is a move that really can’t hurt Sony Ericsson’s image, and is one that we wish more phone-makers would consider making -- how about you?

Source: Sony Ericsson
Photo Credit: Vlad Savov, Engadget.com

HP to add cloud-based music to webOS 3.0

Just days after getting our first good look at webOS 3.0 through video made by the folks at PreCentral, some new information has come together about HP adding a form of cloud-based music syncing to the TouchPad OS. While the details about exactly how the service is going to work are still uncertain, we know from the slides provided by HP to a PreCentral reader that the service is known as HP Music Store (internally at least). It will involve music being streamed from the cloud to the device, with a local cache of the music you are most likely to listen to. This combined with a brief mention of the ability to stream music to an HP smartphone from the tablet make us excited about what’s to come from webOS.

While it may be too early to speculate very much about the value that a service like this brings to the TouchPad itself, it is pretty clear that the addition of content consumption services like a music store could be one of the determining factors in allowing the webOS ecosystem to become a major player in this market. The webOS platform is in dire need of something to compete with iTunes and Zune which already have a stronghold in this consumer space, and Google has already made it’s intentions about Google Music clear. We’re betting that from how far behind their competitors HP and webOS are starting from, instead of simply doing something, they need to do the thing - and we’re hoping this is a good sign that they’re moving in the right direction.

Source: PreCentral

Via: Phone Arena