Smartphones are one of the biggest technological markets today. Whether manufacturing the phones or providing the actual mobile service, mobile carriers and manufacturers are now making more money than ever. These profits are only achieved however by constant innovation and development, and some of the top headlines from the past week alone of this activity are available below.
A new study suggests that by the end of 2014, there will be more mobile phones than people. Clocking in at an estimated 7.3 billion manufactured devices by the end of this year, there will not be enough people on the planet to operate each phone individually. This is not as good of news for mobile phone and smartphone developers as it sounds however due to that exact fact. Without customers to actually use any individual phone, the phone makes zero money for the carrier and is effectively little more than a paperweight.
Meanwhile, NEBI.MOBI is offering a new kind of smartphone service that frees customers from the shackles of service provider contracts. By using open Wi-Fi Networks almost exclusively in conjunction with its own hotspots, the company will be able to transfer data extremely easily. Since Wi-Fi is not controlled by the Government, there are no extra fees or taxes, which results in extremely low cost plans. In the future, the company even plans to implement VoIP calling.
Wi-Fi is incredibly popular with smartphone users already, due to the fact that using data on Wi-Fi does not eat up a customer's data plan. T-mobile US has publicly stated that it would sell the company for any offer above $35 per share, and it seems likely that any company that would take over T-mobile would be operating under the 'Wi-Fi first' access model. Iliad, a french company, is currently one of the top contenders to purchase T-mobile US. The company also plans on assembling their own footprint of Wi-Fi hotspots to support that service, if the purchase does go through.
Finally, Verizon Wireless settled a court case with the FCC for violating several customer privacy rights about a year ago. According to the FCC, Verizon did not give almost 2 million new customers proper privacy notices in their first bill. Despite Verizon's insistance that it was merely an oversight, the company has agreed to pay out $7.4 million to the U.S. Treasury.
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