HTC unveils HTC One series at Mobile World Congress

Mobile World Congress, BARCELONA, SPAIN: HTC, a global designer of smartphones, unveiled its new HTC One series of smartphones that represents its most premium mobile experience with a new level of iconic design and amazing camera and authentic sound experience.

“The best moments in life are captured with a photo or remembered by a song, so it was key for the HTC One series to improve these emotional experiences with an amazing camera and authentic sound experience,” said Peter Chou, CEO of HTC. “We are very focused on creating camera and audio experience that the customers will love and use often and we believe that the HTC One series delivers this experience in a way never seen on a phone before.”

With HTC’s most premium experience, the HTC One series integrates Android 4.0 (ICS) with HTC Sense 4, the new version of HTC’s branded user experience that is introducing HTC ImageSense, a new suite of camera and imaging features that set HTC One apart from other phones. HTC Sense 4 also includes broad enhancements to audio quality and simplifies how people listen to music on their phone.

Amazing camera
With ImageSense HTC One rivals traditional digital cameras with improvements to every part of the camera, including the lens, the sensor, the software, and even integrating a new custom HTC ImageChip. These enhancements combine to deliver our fastest image capture, best image quality under adverse conditions and easiest interface that enables quick access to capturing stills and videos with side-by-side photo and video capture buttons.

• Superfast Capture – HTC One dramatically reduces the time it takes to capture those key moments. In just 0.7 seconds you can take a shot, and with a new superfast 0.2-seconds autofocus, continue to take nearly unlimited continuous shots simply by holding the shutter button.

• Good photos in adverse conditions – HTC One delivers dramatic enhancements in image capture quality even in adverse conditions such as low light, no light or with bright backlighting. The f/2.0 lens on the HTC One X and HTC One S offers best-in-class performance, capturing 40 percent more light than the f/2.4 lenses available on other high-end phones. HTC One also includes HDR, a market-leading technology, for taking great photos even when there are varying levels of brightness.

• Video Pic (Concurrent Video/Still Capture) – With Video Pic you can capture a photo and shoot video at the same time. Now, while you’re shooting HD video, all you have to do is tap the shutter button and it snaps a high-resolution still photo while the video continues to shoot. You can also capture a photo frame from a previously recorded video.

• Dropbox integrated with HTC Sense - HTC One gives you an easy way to save and share your photos and videos. HTC has integrated Dropbox into HTC Sense 4 enabling HTC One customers to get 25 gigabytes of free Dropbox space for two years. That’s enough to store more than 10,000 high-quality photos. Dropbox is also integrated throughout HTC Sense 4, so it’s easy to edit, save and share your documents and other kinds of files.

• Sharing your photos and more - HTC One gives you a new way to share your photos and videos. When you plug in HTC’s wireless Media Link HD* accessory into your TV’s HDMI port, you can easily share your photos, videos, or anything else on your phone with your friends, family or colleagues regardless of the television’s brand as long as it has HDMI.

Authentic sound
With HTC One, Beats By Dr. Dre Audio integration is enabled for the first time across the entire experience for richer, more authentic sound whether you’re listening to your favorite music, watching a YouTube video or playing a game. HTC One also makes it easy to get and listen to your music on your phone with the built-in HTC Sync Manager software that automatically installs to your computer when connected. Once connected, it is easy to transfer songs, artists and playlists from your music library.

Of course, people today no longer just listen to songs stored in their phones; they use streaming services and tune into Internet radio. So HTC One lets you customize the new Music Hub with your favorite services and music applications, like the latest Soundhound technology, giving you one place to go for all of your music needs.

HTC One lets you take all of your music anywhere, including your car. With HTC One, you get an easy way to bring your mobile music to your car’s sound system with the HTC Car Stereo Clip*. It also lets you connect to your music through more than 50 thousand online radio stations worldwide or play music from any service or app on your phone through your car speakers. All this makes HTC One the one place to enjoy all your music, wherever you are, with the power of Beats By Dr. Dre Audio and HTC Car.

HTC One X
The HTC One X features a beautifully crafted polycarbonate unibody that has the ruggedness of metal but is super lightweight. With seamless construction, the unibody combines a unique high gloss ‘piano’ finish and a matte back. HTC One is blazing fast with the new NVIDIA Tegra 3 Mobile Processor for clear graphics, faster applications and longer battery life.

It includes a 1.5GHz Super 4-PLUS-1 quad-core with an integrated fifth Battery Saver Core and a high-performance 12-Core NVIDIA GPU. The HTC One also has an amazing 4.7-inch, 720p HD screen crafted from contoured Corning Gorilla Glass. HTC One X will also be available in selected 4G LTE markets with a LTE-enabled Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor with up to 1.5GHz dual-core CPUs.

HTC One S
The HTC One S is for consumers who want a high-end smartphone in a more compact size. It is powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor with up to 1.5GHz dual-core CPU. It also includes a 4.3-inch screen crafted from contoured Corning Gorilla Glass. HTC One S brings HTC’s innovative metal unibody styling to a new thin 7.9-mm design, making it HTC’s thinnest phone yet.

The HTC One S sports two new finishes that break new ground in mobile phone innovation. The first is an ultra-matte black Ceramic Metal surface that is the result of a microarc oxidation (MAO) process originally developed for use in satellites. It transforms the surface of the aluminum unibody into a ceramic, super-dense crystalline structure that is four times harder than anodized aluminum, enabling the HTC One S to look great over time. The second finish for the One S takes anodizing to a new level with a new patented process that creates a light-to-dark gradient fade that looks gorgeous and sophisticated.

HTC One V
Utilizing the classic, award-winning design of the HTC Legend, the HTC One V brings top-end design to a smartphone with broad appeal and a premium experience that delivers an amazing camera and authentic sound. It features a simple, iconic aluminum unibody design that exudes craftsmanship and quality.

Mindspeed and Contela collaborate on next-gen LTE femtocells and small cell base station solutions

Mobile World Congress 2012, NEWPORT BEACH, USA: Mindspeed Technologies Inc., the industry leader in technology for small cells, and Contela Inc. announced that the companies will jointly develop advanced long-term evolution (LTE) femtocells and other small cell dual mode 3G/LTE solutions.

The collaboration combines Mindspeed’s carrier-grade Transcede System-on-Chip (SoC) baseband processor solutions with Contela’s development expertise. Contela has already developed 3G femtocells that are widely deployed in carrier networks and is now enhancing its wireless products with LTE and dual-mode small cell products.

Mindspeed's Transcede family of processors include complete NodeB and eNodeB SoC solutions that perform concurrent 3G and LTE processing in a single device, including time division synchronous code division multiple access (TD-SCDMA), wideband code division multiple access (WCDMA)/high-speed packet access (HSPA+) and both frequency division duplexing LTE (FDD-LTE) and TD-LTE.

The recently announced Transcede T22xx series targets residential and small enterprise applications, while the T33xx series is focused on enterprise, metro and pico base stations. These products combine Mindspeed’s strength in LTE with Picochip’s leadership in carrier grade 3G.

“As a developer of home femtocell solutions for 3G mobile networks, Contela believes that next-generation networks and applications will require LTE femtocells and other small cell base stations,” said Jang An Kwon, CMO with Contela. “The development of a broad portfolio of small cell products for the different market demands is important to serve our operator customers. Mindspeed’s dual mode T22xx /T33xx SoC baseband processor products deliver multi-standard operation with carrier-grade performance, and are the ideal solution for building our family of products.”

“Mindspeed is delighted that our Transcede SoCs have been chosen by Contela for the company’s next-generation femtocells and other small cell products,” said Dr. Naser Adas, VP and GM, wireless and customer premises equipment (CPE) at Mindspeed. “We have been impressed by Contela’s commitment and expertise in developing small cells. Both companies believe in the huge opportunity of this market and we look forward to a successful collaboration with them.”

Mindspeed has the most complete portfolio of SoCs in the industry, ranging from cost-effective residential 3G only, through the new T22xx and T33xx up to the micro/macro class. All Transcede family devices are supported by a complete, carrier-class software reference design to accelerate time-to-market schedules. Mindspeed’s Transcede reference design includes RF module integration, a real-time Linux board support package, and standard-compliant physical-layer (PHY) implementation for LTE and W-CDMA and TD-SCDMA, with associated utilities and test scripts.

Another year.. another GSMA RCS announcement!

SPAIN: The GSMA has maintained one of its most venerable traditions by announcing a new release to the RCS (Rich Communication Suite) specification at Mobile World Congress. Despite a long history of such announcements, there are no commercial RCS services anywhere. Jeremy Green, principal analyst, Ovum, has the following comment:

“The specification is now at release 5.0, and includes support for “IP-based voice and video calling; geo-location services and cloud storage”. Last year the GSMA announced an “enhanced” version of the specification with less functionality.

“As is also part of the tradition, commercial launches are promised for later in the year. This time the launches are scheduled for ‘this summer’ and involve operators in Spain, with others in France, Germany, Italy and South Korea “also committed to commercial launches in 2012.”

“Most exciting of all, RCS now has a consumer brand – ‘Joyn’, which “…will act as a mark of assurance to customers that they will have simple and direct access to enriched voice and messaging services wherever they are and whatever network they are using,” according the GSMA’s director general, Anne Bouverot.”

Mindspeed and Radisys to demo integrated hardware and software platform for LTE small cell base stations

Mobile World Congress 2012, NEWPORT BEACH, USA: Mindspeed Technologies Inc. and Radisys Corp., a leading provider of embedded wireless infrastructure solutions, announced that the companies will showcase long-term evolution (LTE) base station advances at Mobile World Congress 2012 at Mindspeed's booth (1E.57) at the Fira Montjuïc in Barcelona, Spain from February 27 to March 1, 2012.

The companies will demonstrate a commercially-available eNodeB small cell reference design based on a single SoC. The design utilizes Mindspeed’s carrier-class L1 PHY software and production-grade Transcede 4000-series SoC. Radisys will highlight its fully integrated Trillium LTE TOTALeNodeB software with the Mindspeed Transcede SoC processors to support the demonstration.

The Trillium LTE wireless software provides TEMs with a complete, integrated LTE eNodeB and meets the unique requirements of the network equipment provider. It includes the Trillium LTE eNodeB application, radio resource management (RRM), radio environment monitoring (REM), self-organizing network (SON), schedulers and all of the Trillium protocol layers and stretches from all variations of small cells up to macro cells.

“Mindspeed's Transcede families of processors are a strong solution for small cell access stations. We are working jointly to support multiple customer deployments and have joint engagements that will achieve deployment in the near future. We are also excited about the opportunity to collaborate with Mindspeed in the Picochip integration to deliver a dual mode solution,” said Todd Mersch, product line management director at Radisys.

Mindspeed’s Transcede family of processors are complete NodeB and eNodeB SoC solutions that support concurrent 3G and LTE processing in a single device, including time division synchronous code division multiple access (TD-SCDMA), wideband code division multiple access (WCDMA)/ evolved high-speed packet access (HSPA+) and both frequency division duplexing LTE (FDD-LTE) and time division duplexing LTE (TDD-LTE), with a roadmap to LTE-Advanced (LTE-A).

Combining 3G and LTE processing capabilities into a single chip is more cost effective for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), and the inclusion of a carrier-class physical-layer (PHY) software solution for both 3G and LTE will accelerate time to market, while simplifying development and reducing risk.

Qualcomm to demo LTE broadcast

Mobile World Congress, BARCELONA, SPAIN: Qualcomm Inc., in collaboration with Ericsson AB, will demonstrate LTE Broadcast, the evolved Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Service (eMBMS) platform, at Mobile World Congress 2012 in Barcelona, Spain.

LTE Broadcast enables Mobile Network Operators to adjust coverage and capacity dynamically as needed, allowing for more efficient spectrum and network use. The demonstration will be on display Feb. 27-Mar. 1 in Qualcomm's exhibit in the Fira Convention Center, Exhibit Hall 8, #8B53.

LTE Broadcast is a resource-efficient, scalable solution for delivery of high-bandwidth, high-demand live, premium and software content. The platform has the potential to significantly reduce operators' costs by allowing them to optimize content and software distribution using broadcast principles over LTE networks.

With implementation, operators could schedule broad distribution of software upgrades during off-peak hours or dynamically increase network capacity during peak demand occasions, such as high-density live events like stadium sporting and music concerts.

"Qualcomm is dedicated to the success and adoption of LTE networks worldwide," said Peggy Johnson, executive VP and president, Global Market Development at Qualcomm. "With an increasing number of LTE network rollouts, we are continuously working to produce efficient technology solutions focused on optimizing and maximizing the consumer experience on these mobile networks."

"Video will be the driver of traffic increases in mobile broadband networks," said Johan Wibergh, executive VP, Business Unit Networks at Ericsson. "Driving the LTE broadcast ecosystem is a way to ensure a quality user experience."

With this innovative and emerging technology, Qualcomm enables operators to deploy and scale commercial-grade eMBMS with leading infrastructure vendors such as Ericsson.

ip.access to supply small cell technology to Zain Bahrain

CAMBRIDGE, UK: Leading provider of small cell mobile solutions, ip.access, today announced that leading Middle East operator Zain Bahrain will be deploying its nano3G femtocells and picocells, which will be supplied and installed by E-Pay International.

The contract follows hard on the heels of ip.access confirming last month that it had formed a partnership with E-Pay International to specify, supply and install the market-leading range of ip.access small cell solutions to operator customers in the Middle East.

In Bahrain, E-Pay International will be deploying ip.access' 2G and 3G small cells both for public access and also private business and residential users. The small cell deployments will increase network capacity in busy locations and improve private and public network access both indoors and in hard to reach locations.

Announcing the contract with Zain, Simon Brown, ip.access CEO said: “This is a very rapid vindication of our decision to partner with E-Pay International in the Middle East and we are delighted with the way our relationship is progressing. Zain is one of the region’s leading carriers and this contract is a fabulous endorsement of our technology and E-Pay’s expertise.”

Mohammed Zainalabedin, GM, Zain Bahrain, said: “There is tremendous and growing demand in Bahrain for mobile broadband services and increased voice coverage. With the market-leading ip.access small cell solution we will be able to better serve the needs of our customers by boosting network coverage and capacity.”

Mohammed Al-Barrak, CEO of E-Pay International, said: “We foresee strong demand for small cells solutions in the region – helping operators to deliver voice and data coverage and capacity both in hard to reach and high traffic areas. This agreement will help Zain and its customers get the most from their mobile phones.”

In 2011, ip.access passed the milestone for having globally deployed more than 500,000 3G public and private small cells, confirming its status as the world’s leading vendor. ip.access is exhibiting the nano3G solution, among other small cell innovations, at this year's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona (Hall 1 Stand E02).

Bharti Airtel selects Infosys as technology partner for ‘airtel money’

BANGALORE, INDIA: Bharti Airtel, a leading integrated telecommunications company with operations in 19 countries across Asia and Africa, has chosen Infosys, a global leader in consulting and technology, as its partner for ‘airtel money’ – the country’s first of its kind mobile wallet service by a mobile operator.

Under this partnership, Infosys WalletEdge - the mobile commerce platform will enable the ubiquitous mobile wallet service to support cashless payments and settlement needs of diverse customer segments.

Finacle Digital Commerce is at the core of this platform. It facilitates the creation of a unique ecosystem of card issuers, merchants, financial and retail institutions to offer customers a wide spectrum of payment options for their transactions. The platform will enable ‘airtel money’ customers to pay bills, recharge accounts, shop at over 7,000+ merchant outlets, transact online through multiple channels including mobile phones, Interactive Voice Response, ATMs and Point of Sale.

Infosys WalletEdge is also a highly scalable platform capable of supporting millions of transactions annually in a secure environment. Delivered through a private Cloud, it creates a comprehensive shared services framework that allows members of the ecosystem to process payment instructions seamlessly and cost efficiently.