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Category Archives for "Network World Wireless"

Brocade acquires mobile SDN company

Brocade has announced plans to acquire Connectem, a privately-held company whose virtualization software maps mobile workloads to clouds.Terms of the all-cash deal were not disclosed.+MORE ON NETWORK WORLD:Why SDN All-Stars are heading to Brocade+Connectem’s LTE virtual evolved packet core (vEPC) software for x86 servers is intended to eliminate the constraints of physical equipment while working with traditional node-based EPC architectures, Brocade says.Combined with Brocade’s other software-defined networking (SDN) and virtualized network functions (NFV) offerings – many from the acquisitions of Vyatta, Vistapointe, and the SteelApp virtual ADC product line from Riverbed -- Connectem’s software enables service providers and enterprises to connect mobile and IoT devices, data centers, and public and private clouds, Brocade says.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Samsung Pay could overtake Apple Pay in mobile payments

Apple may have lost its lead in contactless payments yesterday when Samsung introduced its universally accepted Samsung Pay at Mobile World Congress. This may be somewhat surprising considering just last September Apple convinced the mobile industry that it had revolutionized credit and debit card payments with Apple Pay.The combination of Apple Pay's strong security, brand name, and broad support from top banks and merchants impressed Apple fanboys and critics alike. People who never would have trusted contactless smartphone payments were suddenly interested.Samsung also has strong security, brand awareness, and the gravitas to win the support of top banks like Citi and top credit cards like Visa, MasterCard, and American Express. Unlike Apple, it doesn't need the cooperation of merchants because of the Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST) technology Samsung got when it acquired Looppay. MST generates a magnetic field that emulates the swipe of a credit card when the Galaxy S6 is positioned within close proximity of a magstripe card reader at an ordinary credit and debit card payment terminal.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IBM rolls out 3 new iOS apps for enterprises

IBM has unveiled a fresh crop of enterprise apps resulting from the partnership it forged with Apple last year.Announced at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the three new mobile apps for iOS target the banking, retail and airline industries and join the 10 industry-specific IBM MobileFirst apps that arrived in December.Advisor Alerts, for example, is designed for enterprises in banking and financial services and aims to help financial professionals prioritize client-related tasks while away from the office. Powered by customized analytics, the app includes a personalized dashboard that displays recommended next steps and alerts about portfolio-affecting events; it also provides a platform for communication with colleagues back at the office.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IBM rolls out 3 new iOS apps for enterprises

IBM has unveiled a fresh crop of enterprise apps resulting from the partnership it forged with Apple last year. Announced at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the three new mobile apps for iOS target the banking, retail and airline industries and join the 10 industry-specific IBM MobileFirst apps that arrived in December.+ See our full coverage of MWC 2015 + Advisor Alerts, for example, is designed for enterprises in banking and financial services and aims to help financial professionals prioritize client-related tasks while away from the office. Powered by customized analytics, the app includes a personalized dashboard that displays recommended next steps and alerts about portfolio-affecting events; it also provides a platform for communication with colleagues back at the office.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Why small ISPs support net neutrality

In the wake of the FCC's landmark decision last week to classify broadband internet access as a public utility, it was easy to see the battle over net neutrality as a conflict between Democrats and Republicans, between the companies that provide content over the internet and companies that supply the "pipes" that deliver that content.But according to Dane Jasper, CEO and co-founder of California-based ISP Sonic, that would be far too simplistic an analysis. In reality, Jasper says, the warring principles behind net neutrality cut across those lines in surprising ways. As chief executive of a company competing with the big carriers, Jasper clearly has an agenda. But his viewpoint also makes it clear that the carrier industry is not uniformly opposed to net neutrality and Title II regulation.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Google’s Pichai on Xiaomi, Cyanogen and the Apple Watch

In a wide-ranging discussion on stage at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday, Google senior vice president Sundar Pichai offered his views on lots of issues at the heart of the mobile telecommunications industry.He used the time to confirm Google’s plans to launch a mobile carrier in the U.S. and gave an update on progress of its ambitious Project Loon and Project Titan airborne Internet experiments. Here’s what else he said:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Google’s Pichai on Xiaomi, Cyanogen and the Apple Watch

In a wide-ranging discussion on stage at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday, Google senior vice president Sundar Pichai offered his views on lots of issues at the heart of the mobile telecommunications industry.+ See our full coverage of MWC 2015 +He used the time to confirm Google’s plans to launch a mobile carrier in the U.S. and gave an update on progress of its ambitious Project Loon and Project Titan airborne Internet experiments. Here’s what else he said:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

HP will buy Aruba to bolster its wireless networking business

Hewlett-Packard will purchase Aruba Networks to boost its wireless networking business, the companies announced Monday.HP will offer $24.67 per share, giving Aruba a $3 billion value. The deal is worth $2.7 billion taking into account Aruba's debt and cash.MORE: 8 ways to celebrate Raspberry Pi's 3rd birthdayBy buying Aruba, HP will be able to help businesses beef up their wireless networks to meet the demands of an increasingly mobile workforce, the companies said.This is HP's first major acquisition since CEO Meg Whitman announced last year that the company would split into two. One half will focus on enterprise products and the other well sell printers and PCs.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: Small mesh networks will soon help you find things

The famous adage, attributed to many different wits, goes along the lines of "insanity is repeating the same mistakes and expecting different results."Well, maybe that's a bit harsh, but I think you could argue that an indication of intelligence is not repeating the same unproductive act over and over again. And if that's the case, then why do we always misplace things?Surely, the clever thing to do would be to always put things, like car keys, in the same place each time. Like when arriving home, for example. But some of the smartest people I know don't do that.And before we get into a debate about whether those folks are indeed smart—as they look for their keys, I can happily announce that the whole argument is about to become moot.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

From Microsoft: Two new Lumia smartphones to upgrade later to Windows 10

BARCELONA -- Microsoft today announced two new Lumia smartphones running Windows Phone 8.1, which will be upgraded to the cross-platform Windows 10 later in the year. The company gave news media at Mobile World Congress a brief glimpse of how Windows 10 apps, such as an Excel spreadsheet, maps and Outlook email, look on a smartphone display. Windows 10 is currently in a publicly available preview version and will be ready for official release later in 2015. The new phones are the Lumia 640, with a 5-in. display, and the Lumia 640 XL with a 5.7-in. screen. The larger device ships in March and the smaller one in April, and both AT&T and T-Mobile will offer them. Pricing was estimated at about $178 for the Lumia 640 on LTE and about $245 for the Lumia 640 XL on LTE, but pricing will vary by market and operator, Microsoft said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Finnish companies join forces to build secure OS for smartphones and tablets

Finnish companies Jolla and SSH Communications Security are counting on their European origins to help sell a secure mobile operating system they are co-developing. The need for more secure mobile communications has been apparent ever since former U.S. government contractor Edward Snowden made his revelations about National Security Agency (NSA) snooping. SSH is best known for the Secure Shell encrypted communications protocol invented by the company’s founder Tatu Ylönen. Jolla, founded in 2011 by a group of former Nokia employees, sells a smartphone running its open Sailfish OS, and will start shipping its first tablet running the OS next quarter.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Nokia, DoCoMo test high-frequency mobile with an eye on 5G

Nokia Networks and Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo are testing networks using extremely high frequencies that may someday deliver multi-gigabit speed to mobile devices. The companies’ technology trial is using 70GHz radios that today are about the size of a carry-on suitcase. Eventually, the technology will shrink down to about 5 millimeters across to fit in a mobile device. So-called millimeter-wave radios can pack a lot of data into a narrow beam, and the frequencies they’re designed to use aren’t in high demand these days. That’s why Nokia and other vendors see this technology as a key part of the future 5G mobile standard coming in 2020.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The Upload: Your tech news briefing for Monday, March 2

Samsung challenges Google, Apple on paymentsThe world’s biggest maker of Android phones launched a major challenge to Google Wallet on Sunday: it’s going to start a rival phone-based payment system beginning in the U.S. in the coming months. Samsung Pay will work first on the new Galaxy S6 and relies on the contactless NFC payment infrastructure also used by competitors—but with the added advantage that it will also be able to communicate with traditional magnetic card payment terminals.NXP buys Freescale to build a bigger chip companyTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

DoCoMo app shares SIM credentials with offline devices

Japanese mobile carrier NTT DoCoMo has developed an app that can wirelessly send authentication credentials to devices that are not connected to the Internet, allowing more hardware to get online or query the cloud. Potential applications of the technology include the ability to share mobile SIM user credentials such as phone numbers among multiple devices without the need to physically transfer a SIM card. It could also be used for giving online access to IoT (Internet of Things) hardware. Based on prototype hardware announced last year, the Portable SIM App for Android can transfer data with a wave of a hand. The carrier is exhibiting the app at Mobile World Congress this week in Barcelona.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Qualcomm puts silicon brain in flagship Snapdragon 820 chip

Qualcomm wants to help future mobile devices learn about their users, by putting cognitive computing capabilities into its next mobile microprocessor, the Snapdragon 820. The chip will provide mobile devices with some brain-like learning capabilities by incorporating features from Qualcomm’s Zeroth platform. Mobile devices built with the Snapdragon 820 will be able to learn about users over time, picking up human activity patterns and anticipating actions. Putting the machine learning features on the chip, rather than in the cloud, will make mobile devices more personal and more useful than they are today, said Derek Aberle, president of Qualcomm, in a news conference at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Monday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Sony’s Xperia Z4 Tablet is light and has two good cameras

By putting its flagship tablet on a diet, improving cameras and battery life, Sony wants to bring back some luster to the tablet market. Unlike HTC and Samsung Electronics, Sony isn’t launching a high-end smartphone at Mobile World Congress, but is hoping to make up for that with a new flagship tablet, the Xperia Z4 Tablet. It has a 10.1-inch, 1600 x 2560 pixel screen and is powered by Qualcomm’s octa-core Snapdragon 810 processor. The Wi-Fi version weighs 389 grams while the LTE version is slightly heavier at 393 grams, and both are 6.1 millimeters thick.+ See our full coverage of MWC 2015 +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

For a speed boost, Alcatel-Lucent says use both cell and Wi-Fi

If you have both cellular and Wi-Fi, why not use both? At Mobile World Congress, Alcatel-Lucent is demonstrating a way to do that as part of the same network. Cellular and Wi-Fi are rubbing shoulders more than ever, even if that can cause friction in some cases. It’s all part of the quest for more mobile capacity for applications like video streaming. Several ways of using them together are on show at MWC. Like other vendors, Alcatel is pursuing LTE-U, which lets an LTE network use the unlicensed spectrum that powers Wi-Fi. But the French-American company is also demonstrating a technique it calls Wi-Fi boost, where users can upload data to the Internet over cellular and download it using Wi-Fi. The company plans trials of Wi-Fi boost in the second quarter of this year and will start selling it in the second half.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Sony’s Xperia M4 Aqua is full-featured, waterproof and affordable

The mid-range of the smartphone market is getting hyper-competitive, but Sony is betting the waterproof Xperia M4 Aqua will help it make a mark.Well-equipped smartphones that cost US$300 or less is one of the big trends at this year’s Mobile World Congress, and Sony wants in on the action.Last week it launched the Xperia E4g and on Monday it announced the Xperia M4 Aqua.The smartphone will cost about €300 (US$335) when it goes on sale during the second quarter in 80 countries. It has a 5-inch, 720 x 1280 pixel screen and is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 615, an octa-core processor with integrated support for LTE. The processor is a step below the Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 800 family, which is used to power high-end smartphones.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Samsung Galaxy S6 gets 3 things right and 3 things wrong

The Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 edge are two great smartphones, with more power and better screens. But when users get their hands on them starting April 10, they’ll find that the vendor got some things right, and some things wrong.What works:DesignSamsung has been under pressure to improve the design quality of its products after years of using plastic. And the Samsung Galaxy S6 and the S6 edge models have a much more premium look, with metal frames and glass backs. They aren’t quite beautiful, but they are definitely a step up from previous models.SizeTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Net neutrality could hamper new mobile services, Nokia CEO says

New net neutrality rules just established in the U.S. may face a cool reception here at Mobile World Congress, where carriers are prime customers. Nokia’s CEO took an early shot on Sunday night.“There are some services that simply require a different level of connectivity and a different level of service,” Rajeev Suri said at a press conference on the eve of MWC. Those include self-driving cars and remote home health care, which are too important to rely on “best-effort” networks, Suri said.He’s also worried about premium services to consumers: “You just need to be able to differentiate the quality of service for higher-paying consumers,” Suri said. Otherwise, those customers may feel discriminated against, he said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here