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BlackBerry OS? Dead! iOS? Dead! Symbian? Never stood a chance. Android's exponential growth has today been illustrated by Nielsen's statisticians who present us with the above chart of recent US smartphone purchases. It shows that over the six months leading up to August 2010, 32 percent of American new phone buyers had grabbed themselves a device with Google's OS on board, which is comfortably ahead of RIM at 26 percent and Apple at 25 percent. These results corroborate NPD's figures on the matter -- which peg Android at 33 percent of new US purchases -- and reiterate the idea...

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Research In Motion Ltd. lifted the wraps Monday off a touch-screen tablet device called the BlackBerry PlayBook, making it the latest wireless-device maker to step into the new market. At the company’s annual DevCon conference in San Francisco, RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridis billed the PlayBook as “the first enterprise-ready tablet.” He said the tablet is designed to “amplify” the experience of the company’s BlackBerry smart phones, which can pair with the tablet through a Bluetooth connection. “This will enable a new world of computing that you can hold in the palm of your hand,” Lazaridis said...

BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd. could unveil its new tablet computer—as well as the operating system that will power it—as early as next week at a developers' conference in San Francisco, said people familiar with RIM's plans. The tablet, which some inside RIM are calling the BlackPad, is scheduled for release in the fourth quarter of this year, these people said. It will feature a seven-inch touch screen and one or two built-in cameras, they said. It will have Bluetooth and broadband connections but will only be able to connect to cellular networks through a BlackBerry smartphone, these people...

STAMFORD, Conn., September 10, 2010 —    The worldwide mobile operating system (OS) market will be dominated by Symbian and Android, as the two OSs will account for 59.8 percent of mobile OS sales by 2014, according to Gartner, Inc. ... Gartner predicts that by 2014, open-source platforms will continue to dominate more than 60 percent of the market for smartphones. Single-source platforms, such as Apple's iOS and Research In Motion's OS, will increase in unit terms, but their growth rate will be below market average and not enough to sustain share increase. Windows Phone will be relegated...

It's happening, Apple! Google's free and open-source Android operating system shot past its competitors last quarter to become the top-selling U.S. smartphone OS, according to research firm Canalys. Android accounted for 34% of the 14.7 million smartphones sold in the U.S. last quarter, while RIM was 32.1% of the market and Apple was 21.7%, Canalys estimates. That's a huge victory for Google, which was zero two years ago. Yes, Apple's iPhone 4 didn't launch until the very end of the quarter, and Q3 should be bigger for Apple. But the fact that Google is anywhere near Apple's market share --...

There’s nothing wrong with the iPhone 4 that isn’t wrong with its rivals. That claim, made by Steve Jobs at the special iPhone 4 press conference Apple held last Friday, drew a loud round of catcalls from the smartphone industry, which clearly didn’t appreciate being tarred with the same brush that has smeared Cupertino these past few weeks. Nokia (NOK), Research in Motion (RIMM), HTC, Samsung and Motorola (MOT) have all issued statements taking issue with Apple’s claims and accusing it of unfairly trying to draw them into its death-grip drama. Here are their rebukes. -snip- Research in Motion: Apple’s...

The global smartphone market saw its best quarter for the first time in almost three years, according to Strategy Analytics, a research firm. It found that global smartphone shipments jumped by a gigantic 50 percent to 54 million in Q1 from 36 million in the year-ago period. Smartphones accounted for 18 percent of all smartphones shipped. Nokia (NYSE: NOK) shipped a record 21.5 million smartphones to have a leading market share of 40 percent. RIM (NSDQ: RIMM) shipped the second-most handsets to beat Apple (NSDQ: AAPL). The BlackBerry-maker’s market share stands at 20 percent, while Apple’s is at 16.4 percent....

comScore has released a new report on Mobile market share for quarter ending January 2010. There is not much surprise there, but Android has taken a huge leap in the market share gaining 4.3% to have a market share of 7.1% in January 2010, RIM too gained 1.7% to remain the market leader with 43% share Motorola saw a disappointing quarter losing 1.2% share in the handset market, however, they were still market leaders with 22.9%, followed by LG with 21.7%, Samsung with 21.1% and Nokia with 9.1%. RIM, the manufactures of Blackberry saw the only modest increase in devices...

BEIJING: China on Thursday denounced as an 'exaggeration' the latest Pentagon report that its military could pose a credible long-term threat to the US and reaffirmed its strong resolve to deny independence to Taiwan. "China is strongly resentful of and firmly opposed to a US annual report on its military power," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said while reacting to the Pentagon's report. "The 2006 China Military Power Report, issued by the US Defence Ministry, has continued to spread China's threat and severely violated the principles governing international relations," Liu said. He said the report, still with the "Cold...

A new report by the U.S. Defense Department says China is continuing to increase its military capabilities in ways that have already altered the regional military balance and is causing concern about China's future intentions. The annual report is required by Congress. The report says China is increasing its force of short range ballistic missiles that could attack Taiwan and other regional targets, and looking to buy or develop more advanced and capable aircraft and ships. The report says China is also increasing its high-technology ability to disrupt other countries' access to communications, computer networks and other services essential to...

Richmond, Va. -- The U.S. patent office on Wednesday issued its first of several anticipated final rejections of patents held by NTP Inc. related to Research In Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerry device, two days before a judge will hear arguments on an injunction on the wireless e-mail service. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is expected to issue final rejections of four other patents at the heart of the court case, but it's unclear when those actions could come. Another uncertainty is whether the agency's act will sway U.S. District Judge James R. Spencer, who has made it clear he is...

Ha Noi (VNA) -- President Tran Duc Luong and Prime Minister Phan Van Khai exchanged messages of congratulations with Russian President Vladimir Putin and PremierMikhail Fradkov. In their messages, the Vietnamese leaders wrote: "Viet Nam and the Russian Federation (the former Soviet Union) officially established their diplomatic ties on Jan. 30, 1950, creating a foundation for the traditionally friendly and cooperative relations between the two countries for the last half of century. "Over the past 55 years, the Vietnamese and Russian people have mutually fostered and developed the traditional friendship and comprehensive cooperation between the two countries. "A joint communique...

Nestled in the rugged Himalayas, the little known mountain kingdom of Nepal could not seem to be more removed from current geopolitical concerns. Yet on its frozen mountains a revolutionary battle rages. For seven years, Maoist rebels have sought to establish a second totalitarian state in central Asia, at the price of thousands killed and an entire nation left ravaged by its violence. Beginning in February 1996, Marxist-Leninist-Maoists led by the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) -- CPN(M) -- and its leader “Comrade Prachanda” (his real name is Pushpan Kamal Dahal) launched an ongoing effort to overthrow the Kingdom of...

WESLEY CHAPEL, Fla. -- A couple involved in a police chase ended a standoff with authorities on Interstate 75 when they disrobed and ran out of their borrowed truck, the Florida Highway Patrol said. Nicholas Daicoff, 29, was charged Tuesday with fleeing and attempting to elude police, domestic battery, leaving the scene of a crash and resisting an officer without violence. He was being held without bail at the Land O' Lakes jail. He was accused of hitting his wife, Louisa Meyer, 28, during the chase, and telling her to strip her clothes during a 45-minute standoff with officers because...