BARCELONA — Qualcomm's Quick Charge 3.0 technology will let phones with the Snapdragon 820 processor recharge from 0 to 80% in about 35 minutes, but Chinese phone maker Oppo has just announced its own battery-charging technology that blows it away.Announced at Mobile World Congre … | Continue reading
A fractious MWC16 panel on mobile ads brought several executives from the ad industry side plus ad behemoth Google face-to-face with what might be their worst nightmare: network-level mobile ad blocking… Read More | Continue reading
WhatsApp is making it easier to trial new features on Android by opening up its beta testing program on Google Play. Up until now, the Facebook-owned messaging app has required people to manually install an .APK file directly from the WhatsApp website, but now beta-testers can jo … | Continue reading
SoundCloud Pulse, the music streaming service’s dedicated app for artists and creators, is now available on iOS. In an odd move in a market where apps tend to release on iOS first, Pulse first debuted on Android back in November. Like the Android version, the iOS app also aims to … | Continue reading
Hong Kong game publisher Fifth Journey has won backing from film studios Universal Pictures, Lionsgate, and MGM Studios to create movie-based mobile games for Asian markets such as China. The business makes sense because China is already the world’s fastest-growing film market, w … | Continue reading
Following a short invite-only period, accountancy software company FreshBooks has launched its new credit card reader to let merchants accept credit card payments through a smartphone. First announced back in December, the $29 pocket-sized contraption sees FreshBooks go up agains … | Continue reading
BuzzFeed is launching a new mobile app today called BuzzFeed Video, giving you a chance to see all of its videos in one place. Since pretty much every online media company is ramping up its video production, it makes sense to create an app like this. But it’s also a bit of a left … | Continue reading
Microsoft’s HoloLens augmented reality device seems too futuristic to exist, but everything we’ve seen makes it look like it works as advertised. A new video meant for developers (via WinBeta) is giving us our first decent look at the HoloLens user interface in action. The tutori … | Continue reading
BuzzFeed is doubling down on its video efforts with an all-new standalone mobile app. Jonah Peretti, BuzzFeed Founder and CEO, took to the stage at Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona today to announce the aptly-titled BuzzFeed Video, which pulls together all the best videos … | Continue reading
Samsung has opened the doors to what it’s touting as a “first-of-its-kind” public outlet right in the heart of New York City. Located at 837 Washington Street in Manhattan’s Meatpacking district, Samsung 837 isn’t a retail store. Samsung calls it everything from a “cultural desti … | Continue reading
At Mobile World Congress in Barcelona today, Oppo showed how far it’s come in mobile battery tech. The company demoed a prototype device with 2,500mAh power that charged fully in just 15 minutes. That’s crazy fast by any standard. On stage, the device equipped with Oppo’s new Sup … | Continue reading
Telegram has passed 100 million monthly active users (MAUs), the company announced today. During a keynote at Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, Pavel Durov, Telegram founder & CEO, took to the stage to reveal the new milestone figure, which represents an increase of 38 mi … | Continue reading
USMobile is launching its Scrambl3 encryption app for iPhones and Android smartphones today. The app enables users to make secure calls or send secure messages without worrying about eavesdropping, according to USMobile, which includes people who worked with the National Security … | Continue reading
Razer, the gaming technology company based out of Southern California, has raised another round of funding, a Series C that values it at $1.5 billion, TechCrunch has learned. The backing comes in part from China, specifically the Digital Grid subsidiary of IT company Hangzhou Lia … | Continue reading
BARCELONA, Spain — If Cyanogen had its way, all those apps cluttering your smartphone would go the way of the dinosaurs. Of course, that’s not going to happen anytime soon. But the Palo Alto-based company has announced a new version of its Android-based operating system called ‘M … | Continue reading
A panel session probing the perennial heads or tails of mobile device commoditization vs mobile device innovation here at MWC 2016 earlier today heard an interesting range of views. Speakers ran the gamut of mobile makers big and small (Samsung, Motorola/Lenovo and Wileyfox), thr … | Continue reading
If you don’t know which new Samsung Galaxy phone to get for mobile virtual reality, one of the authorities on the subject has weighed in to make your decision easier. For the best experience with the Gear VR head-mounted display peripheral, you should get the standard Galaxy S7 o … | Continue reading
Cheetah Mobile and Cubot have partnered up to introduce a co-branded smartphone called the CheetahPhone. It’s an Android-powered device that is priced at €199 (approximately $220) and is available to everyone in the European Union through Amazon starting in April with pre-orders … | Continue reading
Ever since the Consumer Products Safety Commission declared all hoverboards (AKA self-balancing scooters) unsafe unless they have UL certification, retailers, merchants and manufactures have largely remained mum on what consumers should do about their beloved riders.See also: You … | Continue reading
Samsung aimed to gather the best features of Galaxies past for their S7 line. That included features missing from the S6 like water resistance and a microSD slot, but the company also took the improved design from the S6 line and made it even better. Check out the photos above to … | Continue reading
Kabam is laying 8 percent of its mobile game company workforce today as part of a strategic move to focus on a more narrow type of game that it knows well. It’s not clear exactly how many jobs are affected, as Kabam isn’t disclosing those details. Kevin Chou, the chief executive … | Continue reading
Samsung's new smartphone will use heat pipe technology to keep itself running cool -- and the company is giving a free Gear VR to anyone who pre-orders a Galaxy S7 or S7 Edge. | Continue reading
The nonprofit Pew Research Center today released the results of a survey of more than 1,000 U.S. adults regarding the Apple-FBI encryption debate, and the results may be surprising to the technology industry, which has largely sided with Apple. The results show that 38 percent of … | Continue reading
Today’s mobile landscape is dominated by a handful of companies –Samsung, Apple, and Huawei — making it exceedingly difficult for a new company to generate the capital and the buzz necessary to compete. That’s why Nextbit, a small company formed by veterans of some of the industr … | Continue reading
Skype Qik, Microsoft’s attempt at spinning off video messaging into a simplified mobile application, is shutting down. The app was first introduced in fall 2014 to serve a different audience than the larger, more fully-featured, Skype application. Instead of offering real-time ch … | Continue reading
Microsoft has announced that it will be shutting down Skype Qik on March 24, meaning that you’ll no longer be able to send or receive messages in the video chat application. However, the company said that you should worry because many of the features from Skype Qik have been alre … | Continue reading
SPONSORED: This sponsored post is produced by SessionM. Spring Break season is here. Travelers are packed and ready, and wherever they’re headed, I can guarantee they all have one thing in common in their carry-on — their smartphone. Smartphones play a distinct role in a traveler … | Continue reading
IBM today announced new services available from its public cloud, thanks to deeper partnerships with Apple, GitHub, and VMware. IBM is also launching a new cloud service called Bluemix OpenWhisk that represents an answer to Lambda event-driven computing service from public cloud … | Continue reading
Morgan Freeman is lending his voice to popular GPS driving app Waze, meaning those in the U.S. can be given directions by the soothing, dulcet tones of the legendary Hollywood actor. Freeman joins other big-name stars who have added their voice to the navigation app in the past, … | Continue reading
Verizon, the No.1 U.S. wireless service provider, said it would buy Carl Icahn-owned XO Communications' fiber-optic network business for about $1.8 billion. | Continue reading
Foursquare announced a new product today that should help brick-and-mortar advertisers measure the effectiveness of their campaigns. The company has already been expanding the ad side of the business, for example launching new ad targeting product last year and recently bringing … | Continue reading
Google is partnering with a myriad of mobile operators in a move to expedite the rollout of Rich Communication Services (RCS) on Android. The partnership sees the Internet giant team up with a number of global and regional carriers, including América Móvil, Bharti Airtel Ltd, Deu … | Continue reading
Although I still love my OnePlus One, I’ve grown tired of phones that are 5.5 inches and larger. A big screen for gaming and streaming Netflix is nice to have, but not at the expense of the ability to use your phone with one hand. That’s why I was glad to see that Sony’s all-new … | Continue reading
Two years after Lenovo acquired Motorola, it looks like Motorola is doing fine. Or at least that’s what the business unit is trying to say. Today at a meeting with reporters, Motorola president Rick Osterloh said that the Moto brand is not going anywhere. You can expect more Moto … | Continue reading
Early this morning, Apple CEO Tim Cook sent an email out to employees about the FBI’s request to unlock an iPhone with the subject line ‘Thank you for your support’. The email outlines some responses to Cook’s open letter last week and paints the issue of Apple’s refusal to coope … | Continue reading
Here at Mobile World Congress 2016, the annual Barcelona-based flesh-pressing of the telco industry, Google and a bunch of carriers have put out a press release talking up how they are apparently ‘aligning’ to try to drive adoption of RCS. Read More | Continue reading
U.S. telecoms giant AT&T is partnering with chip maker Intel to test and optimize how drones perform on LTE connections beyond line-of-sight, at higher altitudes, or when faced with external interference. Intel is demoing an LTE-connected drone at Mobile World Congress (MWC) in B … | Continue reading
BARCELONA ( By Eric Auchard, Reuters) – Ericsson and Amazon’s web services division (AWS) said on Monday they have agreed a deal that allows Ericsson, the world’s leading maker of mobile network gear, to act as a bridge for its telecom operator customers to use public cloud servi … | Continue reading
Starting an e-commerce business is tough. Running a profitable one is even tougher. Though there’s no shortage of tips and tricks on growing e-commerce sales, most of them will prove futile if you are not familiar with the right strategies. People should not be unfamiliar with st … | Continue reading
Typically, mobile apps are stand-alone experiences that play nicely with the operating system but aren’t fully integrated in it. Cyanogen — the company best known for its Android-based Cyanogen OS — is launching MOD today, a new developer platform that will give app developers th … | Continue reading
Imagination Technologies has taken the wraps off a new generation of PowerVR graphics chips that will be targeted at high-performance, low-power, and low-cost consumer devices. The graphics processing units (GPUs) will be aimed at low-cost portable devices to 4K televisions. The … | Continue reading
Casting a spotlight on the immense challenges confronting the mobile industry, a new report shows that a range of security and privacy issues have dramatically eroded consumer confidence. According to the study released at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona by Syniverse, a mo … | Continue reading
At the 2015 Mobile World Congress conference in Barcelona today, Facebook announced the formation of the Telecom Infra Project (TIP), an effort that resembles the Open Compute Project (OCP) that Facebook kicked off five years ago but is narrowly focused on development of new tele … | Continue reading
NXP Semiconductors has unveiled what it calls the world’s smallest and lowest-power 64-bit ARM processor for the Internet of Things (IoT). The tiny QorIQ LS1012A delivers networking-grade security and performance acceleration to battery-powered, space-constrained applications. Th … | Continue reading
PayPal wants to us to celebrate this notion of “New Money” in which technology reimagines how we can safely and affordably manage, move, and spend our money. At this year’s Mobile World Congress, the digital payment processor has revealed new carrier partnerships and market expan … | Continue reading
Some victims of the San Bernardino attack will file a legal brief in support of the U.S. government's attempt to force Apple Inc to unlock the encrypted iPhone belonging to one of the shooters, a lawyer representing the victims said on Sunday. | Continue reading
BARCELONA — Samsung is so serious about accelerating VR's reach, it's giving away a free Gear VR (worth $100) to customers who pre-order its new Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge in the U.S.Samsung announced the sweet deal at the Mobile World Congress on Sunday. Pre-orders for the Galaxy S7 … | Continue reading
It’s changed days for Nokia as the former mobile phone giant used Mobile World Congress (MWC) to announce not a sexy new range of smartphones, but a trio of tidbits centering on 5G, the Internet of Things (IoT), and security. Nokia had teased “something big” in the build up to MW … | Continue reading