Born to be Wireless

In order to reduce 300 million euros in operational costs, Sony Ericsson will cut 2000 jobs all around the world within the next twelve months. This was a result of a drop of 97% in the earnings in the second quarter result.
It starting to look more and more like Motorola...

Full history here

Labels: sony ericsson

According to Reuters, Sony Ericsson is talking to India handset-make Spice Mobile about a possible merge. The value of India company would be something up to US$174 million.
"They want to acquire a majority stake, but it has not yet been finalised if it will be a 100 percent buyout," the Economic Times cited the source as saying.
It would be a nice step for SE if Spice could provide technology and the scalability for selling low-end devices, which has never been a priority for SE. The company, a joint venture between Japanese electronics maker Sony, and Swedish telecoms equipment maker Ericsson has lost the fourth position in sales for LG and some analysts are calling it the next Motorola

Labels: sony ericsson, Spice Mobile

Sony Ericsson and Handango join efforts to making available more content to the SE users: all SE phones with Symbian UIQ OS will have access to InHand, an application store.
Also, Handango will provide content to SE Mobile Web Store.
Released the same day of iPhone's App Store :-)

Labels: handango, sony ericsson, symbian, uiq

Sony Ericsson has created Project Capuchin, a new tool that enables developers to combine aspects of Java and Flash technology in the same application. It will be available in the second semester.

According to SE, Project Capuchin will allow 'pure Flash Lite content to be encapsulated in Java ME applications'. SE also says more advanced capabilities will make it possible to create Java ME applications where some or all UI components are defined in Flash.

"[We are] excited to introduce our new bridging technology to the global developer community as it further strengthens our relationship with this community and underscores our ongoing commitment to support an open, healthy and thriving mobile ecosystem.", says Rikko Sakaguchi, SVP and head of portfolio and proposition at Sony Ericsson.

Source: Mobile Entertainment

Labels: Flash Lite, Java ME, sony ericsson

New Java™ Platform 8 (JP-8) phones introduce, among other things, programmatic support for sensors (JSR 256). This example shows how to utilize the sensor API to monitor the built in accelerometer found in the W910 Walkman® phone. This API can, in the same manner, be used for other sensors if available.

Download example MIDlet>>

Sensors like an accelerometer can easily be incorporated into games, enriching the gaming experience on mobile phones. Information regarding available sensors can be retrieved through the use of the following API calls:

String sensorVersion = System.getProperty("microedition.sensor.version");
SensorInfo[] si = SensorManager.findSensors(null, null);

Information contained in the sensor information array specifies exactly what type of information can be retrieved divided into different channels (in this case acceleration in three dimensions: x, y and z). The following is an example of the type of information provided by the accelerometer:

getDescription: ThreeChannelAccelerometer
getUrl: sensor:acceleration;contextType=user;model=ST_LIS302DL;location=inside
Channels:
getName: X
Data type: TYPE_INT
getUnit: G
getAccuracy: 0.0
Measurement range:
getSmallestValue:-2300.0
getLargestValue: 2300.0
getResolution: 0.015625
getName: Y
…
getName: Z
…
In order to utilize the sensor, a connection using the URL specified in the sensor information has to be opened. Once the connection is established, you can either register a data listener (a class overriding DataListener) for automatic callbacks or manually poll the sensor.

SensorConnection sensor = (SensorConnection)Connector.open(URL);
sensor.setDataListener(this, 10);

Sensors like the accelerometer above sample continuously at a fixed rate specified in the sensor information above. The accelerometer has specified a rate of 100Hz as we can see from the sensor information. Specifying the buffer size of a data listener or a "getData()" function call have the effect that the sensor will fill up as many "Data" objects as specified before calling the callback function or returning from the "getData()" function call. In our case this will result in 10 data samples for each call to our data listener, thus it is called 10 times per second (100Hz * 10 samples = 1/10 seconds).

source: Sony Ericsson Developer World

Labels: JSR 256, sony ericsson

"Sony Ericsson Developer World's Virtual Lab service is managed by Mobile Complete using its DeviceAnywhere™ technology and hosted in a dedicated section for Sony Ericsson Developer World members on Mobile Complete's website. The service launches with six of Sony Ericsson's most popular mass-market feature phones announced in 2007 with more phones becoming available as soon as possible after Sony Ericsson's official press announcements. All phones run the latest available, generic firmware."

Virtual Lab overview:

• Global service, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
• Convenient: no shipping of phones or firmware updating required
• Selected 2007 phones, representative of both JP-8 and JP-7
• Tests key presses and network behavior
• On-line session reservation, virtual view of phone and real-time results
• One-hour testing slot per phone, at $18-20 (USD) per hour depending on which monthly pricing package is selected

Sony Ericsson Press Release.

Labels: deviceanywhere, sony ericsson