Category: gadgets

Categories
gadgets

The iPhone effect: III

Reading Time: 2 minutes

(Update) I actually went to the Apple store in West County mall this afternoon, and played with the new iPhone 3G. The first thing noticed is the sign “iPhone 3G is sold out” blah blah blah. I saw a couple in 50s (T-mobile customers) looking for iPhone, and had to leave empty handed. The sales associate acknowledged only a few early birds got the phone. I tried the browser, the touch keypad and youtube. It seems to me the web surfing speed is so so, but again I don’t have benchmark. For some reason I think this thing more like iToy 🙂

(Original) iPhone is here. Yesterday when I drove to work after 9AM, I saw many fans lined up at AT&T store (Creve Coeur, MO).

IMG_6491

There are also wide reports on the glitches in new iPhone 3G launch, such as this one from CNET. This is something I was not surprised, just like the “can not activate using iTune server” I heard last year. I can certainly appreciate the complexity of such an event, but I was not confident on AT&T and Apple’s scaling capabilty here, which is key if Apple wants success in enterprise market. Just like the BlackBerry service outage, those kinds of things are not only annoying for end users but could also lead CIOs to give up on them.

Plus side

Continue reading “The iPhone effect: III”
Categories
gadgets

Don’t count RIM out

Reading Time: 3 minutes

With the iPhone coming, and initial positive review from personal technology Guru such as Walter Mossberg. It’s not easy time for RIM investors and Blackberry users. For one, your friend who gets new iPhone in a few days will laugh your Blackberry is so old tech, with his/her iPhone features touch screen, two fingers zooming in/out a picture, iPod for music and video, all of which a Blackberry can not do. 3G? The Blackberry Bold is coming but at least a month after iPhone launch. Ouch.

Crackberry
But not that fast. While RIM has all the disadvantages compared to iPhone, strangely the blackberries are still selling like crazy, and its subscribers base is also growing: it just added 2.3 million in the quarter ended May 31 (fiscal 1Q 09 call). One thing RIM and Apple users in common is they have kind of cult culture. Check out this crackberry.com and you will get an idea. Seriously I think compared to Apple/iPhone, RIM/Blackberry has the following advantages:

Continue reading “Don’t count RIM out”
Categories
gadgets

iPhone effect: II

Reading Time: < 1 minute

This Friday will be another big day for the Apple fans, the 3G iPhone will be unveiled globally. The past weekend I stopped by the local Apple store, I have not been to there for 6 months so my impression maybe more genuine. Besides the iPod touch (iPhone was absent), I found some of the sales associates are incredibly young, they look like high school kids. This reminds me many high school kids carrying MacBooks at the county library. So in a word, Apple was doing peer to peer marketing here?

What’s the use for iPhone?
I saw this question posted in Trader1688. Don’t laugh, this is a legimate question. My initial thought is the usual stuff such as MP3/video playback, web browsing, GPS,…as desribed in its offical web page.

Continue reading “iPhone effect: II”
Categories
gadgets

iPhone vs. Blackberry Bold

Reading Time: < 1 minute

From YouTube, author: the iPhone blog

BTW, I found other blackberry videos at YouTube to be good (authors: phonescoop, crackberry).

Categories
gadgets

It’s the software, smartphone?

Reading Time: 2 minutes

I don’t have a smartphone, but I used to have Palm m100 (original), and Palm Tungsten E. I did not use it for power point, calendar or anything serious, the main functionality I used is its real player. It got 128 M SD card, so I can store about 30 songs on it.

Palm Tungsten E2 pic

Today’s smart phone is much more sohpiscated. Besides traditional voice capability, email, messaging (instant, text and multimedia), some phones also got web browsing, MP3/video playback, camera and video capturing, word/excel/power point editing. As I understand some blackberry can do SAP, IBM Lotus, or used as a remote control for home applicance (source: RIM June 25 conference call).

Market

Continue reading “It’s the software, smartphone?”
Categories
gadgets

RIM: bear case, bull case

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Bear case
RIM (Nasdaq: RIMM) missed both top line and bottom line in Q1, and issued not so strong outlook for Q2. Read news from Reuters for more details. Q1 revenue is $2.24 b vs. expected $2.27 b; earning was $0.84 vs. 0.85. While I think missing of bottom line is understandable because of spending in R&D, the revenue miss is not because its competitor iPhone was sold out going into the end of quarter.

Competition from iPhone will intensify. New 3G iPhone will be launched on July 11, and it is deceptively priced at $199. The reason I said “deceptively” is the real owner cost is much higher (see Christopher Null, How the half-price iPhone 3G actually costs you more).

Continue reading “RIM: bear case, bull case”
Categories
gadgets

The iPhone effect: I

Reading Time: < 1 minute

I did not take too seriously of iPhone when it was launched a year ago. But I was wrong. My initial thought Apple jumped into the mobile phone world with a touch screen smart phone, with way too much fan fare (remember the Ads on CNBC, CNN etc?).

Well, now I think it set a new standard for smart phones for consumers. Apple announced its new 3G iPhone recently, and there are interesting customer spending analysis (Christopher Null) and iPhone manufacturing analysis (iSuppli). Numbers aside, a more intereting phenomena is, since the announcement of 3G iPhone, Nokia (NYSE:NOK) stock continued to drop. Note Nokia mainly sells outside of the US, while iPhone sells mainly inside the US. Interesting? The perception must be iPhone is going to each Nokia’s dinner: its source of profit, the N series smart phones.

iPhone and the rest of the world
Here in the US, I have seen Sprint launched this Instinct (Samsung), Verizon already got touch screen Voyger (LG).

Continue reading “The iPhone effect: I”
Categories
gadgets

K-touch: from Shanzhaiji to darling

Reading Time: 2 minutes

K-touch (Tianyu 天宇or天语, benephon), a Chinese Shanzhaiji maker a few years ago, reached the top spot in domestic brands (in terms of sales). It sold 17 million handsets last year, beating all the big boys (Ningbo Bird, Xiameng Amoi, Lenovo Handset), and plans to sell 30 millions this year. Recently it also raised 530 m RMB from US private equity firm Warburg Pincus (Chinese news here). The following is a picture of upcoming Tianyu K-touch in series C800 8M camera phone. The MSRP will be CNY 2800 (about $400). A comparable phone from Nokia will cost twice, according to Tianyu. You can read see more C800 pictures at softpedia.

Tianyu K-touch in series C800 8M camera phone pic

In Chinese 天语 means voice from heaven. Romantic name, isn’t it?

Continue reading “K-touch: from Shanzhaiji to darling”
Categories
gadgets

Players in China Telecom re-org: foreign investment banks

Reading Time: 2 minutes

I planned to write more about China telecom re-org (revamp, reform) after the recent announcement. Now the CFA test is over, I have more time to think about this.

A few days ago I read this interesting Chinese article which describes some foreign investment banks actions after the re-org news (Appendix). Let me try to explain in simple words. The China telecom re-org is widely anticipated to happen this year, the conventional wisdom is the decesion will be made after August Beijing Olympics. Those investment banks created many warrants (European options) in HKSE with expiration date in August, thinking the annoucement of re-org will make the China Mobile, China Unicom, China Telecom and China NetCom stocks trades in Hongkong have a big swing. They can make money from that.

Continue reading “Players in China Telecom re-org: foreign investment banks”
Categories
gadgets

Second thought on China Mobile CHL

Reading Time: 3 minutes

(Update May 26 11:35PM) Just found the Google finance has the wrong EPS and PE ((EPS 2.62, PE 29.92) for CHL. Yahoo finance has the right number for CHL: ttm EPS $3.08, PE 25.44 as of Friday May 23.

Market sentiment
GS downgrade (Bloomberg): the ladies at Goldman Sachs cut the rating of 0941 (China Mobile H share) from neutral to sell, and cut price target from 135 HKD to 105 HKD. I don’t trust Goldman rating blindly (no disrespect to people at GS), this downgrade combined with the share drop both in NYSE and Hongkong, signals the big boys are leaving the table. I don’t want to stick my head out at this time, so I am going to sell 2/3 of my CHL shares tomorrow morning (Tuesday May 27).

China telecom re-org pic
(Source: XinHuaNet)

More background of the re-org, 3G license

Continue reading “Second thought on China Mobile CHL”