iPad mini to be unveiled after the iPhone 5, in October?

Apple is expected to unveil their sixth generation iPhone, called the iPhone 5, on September 12. But that's not the only device making the rounds on the rumour mills all over the Internet.

Apple’s long debated iPad mini that has been rumoured since the launch of the original iPad may finally be unveiled after the iPhone 5.

Sources have told AllThingsD that only after then next-gen iPhone is out the door that Apple will unveil the iPad mini, a tablet that is expected to have a display smaller than 8-inches. The tentative launch period of the device is October, a mere month after the launch of the iPhone 5. The reasons for the split in the event of the two devices is quite obvious, since both the devices have generated considerable hype.

The late Steve Jobs, ex-CEO and co-founder of Apple was quite against the idea of the iPad mini but he isn’t in charge anymore. Rumours of the iPad mini have been making their appearances online every time a new 7-inch tablet is launched in the market. We have seen this trend during the launch of the Kindle Fire and theNexus 7 tablets.

Another device that is expected to get a revamp and be unveiled at the same time as the iPhone 5 is the iPod touch. The device has always maintained a similar form factor as the iPhone and we think that the device too may get a refresh this year.

Sources: thinkdigit, allthingsD.com

School admissions may go online in Goa

PANAJI: Long queues, unending wait and days of uncertainty for parents could be a thing of the past as Goan schools could experiment with online admission and payment of fees from the next academic year.
Goa is among three states that have agreed to implement the central government's Mission Mode Project on a pilot basis for computerization of educational institutes.

The state has also expressed its readiness in implementing online performance tracking of students and teachers, online issuance of leaving certificates and readying software for preparation of timetable, results and tests.

"The volume of data for Goa is small but it's not captured and organized in a timely and systematic manner. Data and reports are not available readily when required," Goa's presentation to officials of the Union human resource development ministry states.

"With the implementation of the project, Goa wants to achieve 100% enrolment, improvement in quality of education, perfect planning of programmes and easy availability of school data," the presentation notes.

An essential component of the project will be 'student tracking', which will enable a school to keep track if a child leaving the school has joined one elsewhere in the state or country, or has opted to drop out. This feature is expected to help in arresting drop outs.

Goa has said that it has created computer laboratories in 432 schools consisting of 10 multimedia systems each and training for computer aided learning has already been provided to teachers. The state is also banking on chief minister Manohar Parrikar's budget assurance that all students from Class V to IX will be provided notebooks or tablets by 2013-14.

"Two workshops were held of states and union territories across the country, one of which was attended by Goa officials and a presentation was made on what Goa plans to implement under the project. The central government has agreed to our proposal in principle. The state has agreed to implement the project on a pilot basis. At the final workshop to be held within the next few months, the details of the project's implementation will be finalized," an official from the state education department told TOI.

It is expected that communication between parents, schools and teachers will take place via the internet once the project comes into force and the department plans to carry out payment of salaries and provident fund online.

Chattisgarh and Lakshadweep are the two others that have expressed their willingness to implement the project on a pilot basis.

Chief minister launches cyberage scheme

MARGAO: Chief minister Manohar Parrikar launched the cyberage scheme at a function held at Rosary Higher Secondary School at Navelim and distributed laptops to a total of 626 students under this scheme. Goa will march ahead of Singapore city by next year, which has the figure of having 35 computers per 100 families, he added while speaking at the function.
He said, UNESCO through MIT taught of advocating the use of computer/laptop per child in 2005 when Goa had already formulated and implemented the same in 2002, four years before. Parrikar informed that the I-Pad's to be provided to the middle school children will be preloaded with educational contents.

Parrikar further emphasized the need to educate and counsel the children of making the optimum use of the latest technology and staying away from its misuse, at the wrong age.
Pointing out that there were different opinions and apprehensions from various sections of the society, when the cyberage scheme was launched, of kids getting spoilt and distracted from education, he asserted that the students benefited from the cyberage scheme of the year 2002 are the smartest grown-up youths around now.
Minister for Labour and Fisheries, Avertano Furtado speaking on the occasion appealed to the students to make good use of the laptops in well being of one's own self and the nation at large.
Fr. Simon Diniz, Principal of Rosary College, Navelim, sarpanchas and panchas of all the panchayats of Navelim Constituency were present on the occasion. Fr. Jose Roque Gonsalves, Parish priest of Our Lady of Rosary Church, Navelim also spoke on the occasion.

Apple's victory could mean fewer phone options

Apple Inc.'s $1 billion legal victory could mean fewer smartphone options for consumers to choose from, analysts said.A federal jury's verdict Friday that Samsung Electronic Co. stole Apple's technology to make and market smartphones using Google's Android software sends a warning to other companies manufacturing similar devices, the biggest marketplace threat to Apple.
"Some of these device makers might end up saying, 'We love Android, but we really don't want to fight with Apple anymore,'" said Christopher Marlett, CEO of MDB Capital Group, an investment bank specializing in intellectual property. "I think it may ultimately come down to Google having to indemnify these guys, if it wants them to continue using Android."
That's if the verdict stands. Samsung, the Seoul-based global leader among smartphone makers, vowed to fight. Its lawyers told the judge it intended to ask her to toss out the verdict.
"This decision should not be allowed to stand because it would discourage innovation and limit the rights of consumers to make choices for themselves," Samsung lead lawyer John Quinn said. He argued that the judge or an appeals court should overturn the verdict.
Apple lawyers plan to formally demand Samsung pull its most popular cellphones and computer tablets from the U.S. market. They also can ask the judge to triple the damages from $1.05 billion to $3 billion.
U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh will decide those issues, along with Samsung's demand she overturn the jury's verdict, in several weeks. Quinn said Samsung would appeal if the judge refuses to toss out the decision.
Apple Inc. filed its patent infringement lawsuit in April 2011 and engaged the country's highest-paid patent lawyers to demand $2.5 billion from its top smartphone competitor. Samsung Electronics Co. fired back with its own lawsuit seeking $399 million.
The jury on Friday rejected all Samsung's claims against Apple, but also decided against some of Apple's claims involving the two dozen Samsung devices at issue.
It found that several Samsung products illegally used such Apple creations as the "bounce-back" feature when a user scrolls to an end image, and the ability to zoom text with a tap of a finger.
The U.S. case was the latest skirmish in a global legal battle between the two tech giants. Its outcome is likely to have ripple effects in the smartphone market. Other device makers relying on Android, the mobile operating system that Google Inc. has given for free to Samsung and other phone makers, may be more reluctant to use the software and risk getting dragged into court.
During closing arguments, Apple attorney Harold McElhinny claimed Samsung had a "crisis of design" after the 2007 launch of the iPhone, and executives were determined to cash in illegally on the success of the revolutionary device.
Samsung's lawyers countered that it was legally giving consumers what they want: smartphones with big screens. They said Samsung didn't violate Apple's patents and alleged innovations claimed by Apple were created by other companies.
Samsung said after the verdict that it was "unfortunate that patent law can be manipulated to give one company a monopoly over rectangles with rounded corners."
"This is by no means the final word in this case," Quinn said in a statement. "Patent law should not be twisted so as to give one company a monopoly over the shape of smartphones."
The jurors' determination that Samsung took Apple's ideas probably matters more to the companies than the monetary damages, Marlett said.
"I don't know if $1 billion is hugely significant to Apple or Samsung," Marlett said. "But there is a social cost here. As a company, you don't want to be known as someone who steals from someone else. I am sure Samsung wants to be known as an innovator, especially since a lot of Asian companies have become known for copying the designs of innovators."
Apple and Samsung combined account for more than half of global smartphone sales. Samsung has sold 22.7 million smartphones and tablets that Apple claimed uses its technology. McElhinny said those devices accounted for $8.16 billion in sales since June 2010.
Samsung's Galaxy line of phones run on Android, and ISI Group analysts viewed the verdict as a blow to Android as much as Samsung.
If Android lose any ground in the mobile computing market, that would hurt Google, too. That's because Google relies on Android to drive mobile traffic to its search engine and services to sell more advertising.
Google entered the smartphone market while its then-CEO Eric Schmidt was on Apple's board, infuriating Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, who considered Android to be a blatant rip-off of the iPhone's innovations.
After shoving Schmidt off Apple's board, Jobs vowed that Apple would resort to "thermonuclear war" to destroy Android and its allies.
The Apple-Samsung trial came after each side filed a blizzard of legal motions and refused advisories by the judge to settle the dispute out of court. Legal experts and Wall Street analysts had viewed Samsung as the trial's underdog. Apple's headquarters is just 10 miles from the San Jose courthouse, and jurors were picked from the heart of Silicon Valley, where Jobs is a revered technological pioneer.
A verdict came after less than three days of deliberations, surprising observers who expected longer deliberations because of the case's complexity.
While the issues were complex, patent expert Alexander I. Poltorak has said the case would likely boil down to whether jurors believed Samsung's products look and feel like Apple's iPhone and iPad.
Samsung's lawyers argued that many of Apple's claims of innovation were either obvious concepts or ideas stolen from Sony Corp. and others. Experts called that line of argument a high-risk strategy because of Apple's reputation as an innovator.
Apple's lawyers argued there is almost no difference between Samsung products and those of Apple, and presented internal Samsung documents they said showed it copied Apple designs. Samsung lawyers insisted that several other companies and inventors had developed much of the Apple technology at issue.
Apple and Samsung have filed similar lawsuits in South Korea, Germany, Japan, Italy, the Netherlands, Britain, France and Australia.
"This is not the final word in this case or in battles being waged in courts and tribunals around the world, some of which have already rejected many of Apple's claims," Samsung said in its statement.
Samsung won a home court ruling earlier Friday in the global patent battle against Apple. Judges in Seoul said Samsung didn't copy the look and feel of the iPhone and ruled that Apple infringed on Samsung's wireless technology.
But like the jury in California, South Korean judges said Samsung violated Apple's technology behind the "bounce-back" feature. Both sides were ordered to pay limited damages.
The Seoul ruling was a rare victory for Samsung in its arguments that Apple has infringed on its wireless technology patents. Samsung's claims previously were shot down by courts in Europe, where judges ruled that Samsung patents must be licensed under fair terms to competitors.
The U.S. case is one of some 50 lawsuits among myriad telecommunications companies jockeying for position in the burgeoning $219 billion market for computer tablets and smartphones.

Sources:gadgets.ndtv

Sweeping Apple win, but Samsung could come back stronger

Defeat in a bitter patent wrangle with Apple Inc, its smartphone rival and biggest customer, will dent Samsung Electronics Co's $21 billion cash-pile, but could actually help cement its leadership in the global smartphone market.

A U.S. court has ordered Samsung - which sold around 50 million phones in April-June, almost twice the number of iPhones - to pay $1.05 billion damages, after ruling that the South Korean firm infringed on some Apple patents.

While the verdict was a big win for Apple, the damages are less than half the $2.5 billion compensation it sought - although that could yet be increased by the judge - and are just 1.5 percent of annual revenues from Samsung's telecoms business.

That phone and tablet business is the powerhouse behind Samsung's growth, earning around 70 percent of total profit. The group had net profit of $4.5 billion in April-June.

Samsung could also see its popular Galaxy smartphone banned from sale in the United States. But its skill as a "fast executioner" - quick to match others' innovations - would likely mean tweaked, non-patent infringing devices would be on the market soon after any ban came into place.

"Samsung has already made some design changes to new products since the litigation first started more than a year ago," said Seo Won-seok, an analyst at Korea Investment & Securities. "With the ruling, they are now more likely to make further changes or they could simply decide to raise product prices to cover patent-related payments."

Also, Apple's demands for Samsung to pay it a royalty on its phone sales could hit rival phones using Google's Android operating system more than it hits Samsung. If anything, the blaze of publicity from the high-profile, high-stakes U.S. litigation has made Samsung's brand more recognisable.

Contradicting verdicts
The California jury had only begun deliberating on Wednesday after a complex weeks-long trial. Friday's verdict on seven Apple patent claims and five Samsung patent claims suggests the nine-person panel had little difficulty in concluding that Samsung had copied some features of Apple's iPhone and iPad.

It could lead to an outright ban on sales of key Samsung products, with Apple saying it planned to file for a sales injunction within seven days and the judge in the case setting a hearing on September 20.

Because the jury found "wilful" infringement, Apple could seek triple damages.

The U.S. ruling, read out to a packed federal courtroom in San Jose, just miles from Apple's headquarters, came less than 24 hours after a Seoul court found that while the iPhone and Galaxy look very similar Samsung hadn't violated Apple's design.

Samsung issued a defiant response to the U.S. decision, which it called "a loss for the American consumer", indicating the legal tussle is far from over. "This is not the final word in this case or in battles being waged in courts and tribunals around the world, some of which have already rejected many of Apple's claims," Samsung said in a statement.

Nomura analyst CW Chung, speaking before the verdict, predicted it could take "many years" for Apple and Samsung to settle the case whatever the result of this round, leaving the two firmly in control of the $200 billion-plus global smartphone market.

"The litigation may end up with both parties entering a cross-licensing agreement, which should enable them to build a higher patent wall in the smartphone market," said Chung. "This would have a positive impact on the share prices of Samsung and Apple, while posing a substantial threat to other competitors."

Based on the damages ruling, Samsung is asked to pay Apple around $10 royalty per phone, a move seen aimed at slowing rival phones that run on Android - which account for more than two-thirds of the global market.

If Apple were to pursue similar legal challenges against other Android manufacturers that could squeeze profit margins as smartphone prices decline in a growing market - reinforcing the dominance of Samsung, one of the few with big enough margins to absorb the extra cost.

Handset competitors using Android include Taiwan's HTC Corp, LG Electronics, Google's Motorola, Sony Corp and some Chinese brands.

Win some, lose some?
Although Samsung had been viewed as the underdog in the U.S. case, the sweeping nature of Apple's victory was something of a surprise, with many analysts having expected a mixed ruling.

Concerns over potential reputational damage, the short-term cash hit and the impact on billions of dollars of business with Apple had knocked as much as 5 percent off Samsung's shares this week in the run-up to the verdict. But the stock is still up nearly 50 percent since Apple filed its accusations.

Samsung has previously been able to move nimbly to release model upgrades by the time courts have ruled certain products infringed Apple patents and retire patent-infringing models from its line-up. It has skirted around those rulings with a few engineering tweaks and has also made some bold design changes to differentiate its devices from Apple's.

"The impact on Samsung will be quite limited, as affected models are mostly legacy products and its new products did make some design changes to avoid potential litigation," said D.J. Jung, representative patent attorney for SU Intellectual Property.

"Still ... it's a sweeping loss in the most important market. It's inevitable that Samsung's brand will be negatively affected - Samsung could be perceived as a copycat."

Even though Samsung's flagship Galaxy S III phone was not involved in the trial, the jury validated Apple's patents on features and design elements that Apple could then try to wield against that product.

It is possible Apple would not have to seek an entirely new trial against the S III, but rather include it in a "contempt proceeding" which moves much faster, said Nick Rodelli, a lawyer and adviser to institutional investors for CFRA Research in Maryland.

Seoul-based Jung predicted further appeals and fresh suits against newer products as the rivals continue to clash in court.

"It's going to be a very drawn-out battle," he said. "They will keep suing each other, appeal against unfavourable verdicts and bring in new products ... because the stakes are too high. They don't want to lose their initiative in the fast-moving smartphone market."

Outside the box
In a research note before the verdict, UBS analysts said an Apple win could, in the long-run, hurt the U.S. firm "as the real threat is not a competitor beating Apple at its own game, but instead changing the game.

"The likelihood of Apple being leapfrogged or a rival creating a new category (of device) is greater if they have to think out of the box. If they just copy Apple, like Coke, Apple can claim to be 'the real thing'."

Samsung also looks to be staying ahead of the curve - by reviving the stylus function, derided by Apple's Steve Jobs, in its latest tablets and by creating the hybrid phone-cum-tablet, or phablet, category, with its 5.3-inch Note.

Apple, which has largely stood by its original form and design, is taking note, with speculation that the next iPhone will have a bigger screen and new iPads may be smaller.

In China, set to become the world's biggest smartphone market this year, Samsung has almost twice Apple's market share, and the iPhone slipped to fourth in the market in April-June, overtaken by both Lenovo Group Ltd and ZTE Corp, according to latest data from industry research firm IDC.

Despite, or because of, the publicity from the U.S. case, and more than a dozen pending cases elsewhere around the globe, the Samsung brand has gained recognition - as an equal to Apple rather than merely a supplier.

In a recent Campaign Asia-Pacific brand ranking, Samsung came top ... ahead of second-placed Apple.

Copyright Thomson Reuters 2012
Sources:gadgets.ndtv