News

• Reporter's Notebook: MWC trades castles for putting greens

  The Mobile World Congress exhibition in Barcelona closed its doors on Thursday, with a sudden rain shower sending the last attendees scurrying off to their hotels. It's been a gargantuan affair that saw pretty much everyone who is anything in the mobile phone industry (minus Apple) make some sort of announcement. Following are a few side notes that probably didn't make the headlines, from IDG News Service reporters:

• Mobile carriers, vendors eager to virtualize networks

  There has to be a sea change in how mobile operators build their networks and implement new services, and virtualization will make it possible, carriers and equipment vendors say.

• Five smartphone and tablet trends from Barcelona

  This year's MWC may have been lacking in high-end smartphone launches, but the "W" stands for "world" and lower-cost models shown this week are needed to open up the mobile-phone market to more people globally.

• ARM CEO hopeful for Windows RT

  Microsoft's new version of Windows written for ARM processors may not be an unqualified success, but ARM's CEO Warren East said the software maker will learn from its mistakes with Windows RT and come back with a better product.

• TD-LTE goes mainstream with a new performance promise

  A version of LTE that could give consumers more mobile bandwidth for downloading content or apps is moving from the margins to the mainstream at Mobile World Congress this week.

• General Dynamics eyes government-level security on smartphones

  General Dynamics is looking to bring U.S. government-level security to consumer smartphones, allowing organizations to benefit from the type of strong data protection only available on expensive and clunky mobile terminals.

• ARM's battery-saving technology debuts in tablet, smartphone prototypes

  ARM is promising close to 70 percent processor power savings with a new chip design called Big.Little, and mobile devices on display at the Mobile World Congress provided the first glimpse of how the technology works.

• Regulator calls for phone makers to come clean on radio quality

  A top European regulator wants operators and vendors to work together on a grading system that tells consumers how good the antennas in their smartphones are, allowing them to take that into account when buying a new device.

• Cost of LTE smartphones dropping surprisingly fast, analyst says

  Products from several smartphone vendors and processors from the likes of Nvidia are helping drive down the cost of LTE-enabled devices.

• Sony releases Firefox OS software for developers

  Sony Mobile will provide an experimental version of the Firefox OS on one of its smartphones so that advanced developers can try it out and start working on applications.

• Intel takes on ARM in low-cost Android tablet market

  One of the first low-cost Android tablets with an Intel x86 processor was announced at Mobile World Congress, setting the stage for a long battle between the world's largest chip maker and ARM, whose processors go into most tablets today.

• Nokia Siemens to tackle overload with base-station smarts

  Nokia Siemens Networks says it can prevent LTE base stations from getting overloaded while extra capacity in nearby cells goes to waste, even if the cells use different types of spectrum.

• Engineers deconstruct smartphones to find new uses

  Smartphones, it seems, can do anything.

• China Mobile unveils 4G LTE TDD phones

  China Mobile has unveiled four smartphones built to run on its upcoming 4G LTE TDD network, with the handsets coming from foreign brands including HTC and LG, and Chinese handset makers Huawei and ZTE.

• Tizen mobile OS shows some teething issues

  Mobile operators are passionate about the Tizen OS, but it appears there's a lot of work to do before the smartphones running it will go on sale later this year.