It is estimated that in 2015 over 88 million new cars were bought. Almost 53 million came out of just six manufacturers: Toyota, Volkswagen Group, General Motors, Renault-Nissan, Hyundai and Ford. If you add five million from FCA (Fiat Chrysler Automobiles), that’s almost 60 million vehicles. It is of no surprise that traditional PC and mobile names such as NVIDIA, Qualcomm, Intel all see the automotive industry as a key battlefield. Tens of millions of processors promise advanced telemetry, self-driving or automated driving capabilities, new level of infotainment, and ‘always online’ vehicles. In a research document called Automotive Safety and Autonomous Driving Service, ABI Research put out a
AT&T-Vodafone Venture: Good Times Ahead For Global Mobile Industry?
The world’s mobile industry is on the brink of a major shakeup. With European Vodafone Group (LON: VOD) having divested its stake in US carrier Verizon Wireless (NYSE: VZ) , the stage is open for a possible deal with yet another American player, AT&T (NYSE: T). Sources close to both Vodafone and AT&T have said that executives from the two companies are laying the groundwork for a possible acquisition, merger or partnership, which will boost the combined network’s coverage to about 500 million subscribers — second only to China Mobile’s (HKG: 0941) 740 million. In a deal estimated to reach US$175 billion at Vodafone’s current market capitalization, AT&T is
Fancy phones need protection
In a period of 24 hours, I managed to scratch my Blackberry Bold, while a friend of mine scratched is iPhone 3G. In the case of Bold, it was give-or-take my fault: Vodafone did not provide protective carrying case in the box, nor it was available for buying – thus, I had a relatively unprotected device filled with “shiny parts”. Given the fact that I was moving my things from Mountain House to Frisco, one can judge that it was my own fault. But in the case of iPhone… the scratched part was actually discovered when a good friend of mine removed the protective case