Sony Ericsson Buyout Deal Completed

Sony’s has announced that its buyout of Ericsson from its Sony Ericsson mobile partnership has been completed, and Sony’s mobile division is now called Sony Mobile Communications. Sony paid around $1.47 billion to buy Ericsson out of the two companies mobile phone partnership, and future smartphones from Sony will now we released under the ‘Sony’ brand.

Sony will rename Sony Ericsson “Sony Mobile Communications”, and further integrate the mobile phone business as a vital element of its electronics business, with the aim of accelerating convergence between Sony’s lineup of network enabled consumer electronics products, including smart phones, tablets, TVs and PCs.

We can expect to see all of Sony’s new smartphones at MWC 2012 bearing the Sony brand, we have already seen a couple of leaked devices and are expecting Sony to unveil a few more smartphones later this month. Sony recently posted losses, and it will be interesting to see whether their new Sony Mobile Communications company is able to help Sony get back into the black.

Do not buy Sony Ericsson Aino Problems Touch Screen:

The state of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich updates

Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) is a big update to Android for handsets. So big, that it's got some phone makers hesitant whether they'd even update their devices to the new version. First, it was LG which dropped the bomb on Facebook by saying it's not going to update its LG Optimus 2X flagship. The company quickly changed its position and is "currently in the process of planning the ICS OS update for the LG Optimus 2X as well as other LG high-end smartphones," according to a note which also appeared on the social network.

But it's not just LG – pretty much every other major phone maker has been vague about updating its handsets to ICS. HTC, which was recently ranked as the number one smartphone vendor in the States, judging by smartphone shipments, said it "has been looking closely at the new OS's features and functionality to determine our upgrade plans." The Taiwanese are likely to update their high-end handsets, but when it comes to exact models the company says it needs more time: "Our goal is to upgrade as many HTC devices as possible and we'll be sharing details on specific devices and timing in the coming weeks!"

Update HTC: HTC has announced that it's Sensation series will be the first to get ICS by the end of March. It has also added more handsets to its list of ICS-eligible devices, which will get updated later in 2012.

Samsung, which has gathered some negative PR after some of last year's Galaxy S models took a long while to get bumped up to new Android versions, has now said that its top-tier smartphones will get Android 4.0. The list includes all 9xxx models, so that means that last year's Samsung Galaxy S in all of its flavors should also be bumped up to the new Android.

Motorola, which is now closer to Google than any other phone manufacturer, seems to be the only company which has given us exact time frames. Moto has pledged to deliver ICS updates six weeks after Google pushes the public release.

Sony Ericsson has also given us a vague promise that it will bring ICS to its devices, but there it seems that the situation will depend a lot on Sony, which is taking over the company in the near future.

With so much uncertainty, we've decided to post a table of everything we know about Android Ice Cream Sandwich updates on various handsets and tablets. We'll update it as soon as we hear about a particular devices getting the update or being denied, so make sure to bookmark it and check back every once in a while.

Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) Review & State of Mobile Discussion:

Sony Ericsson "Kumquat" will launch as the Sony Xperia U

We just recently heard about the Sony Ericsson Kumquat, and mercifully it’s being reported that the midrange Android handset will ship with a different name. Of course the majority of phones ship with a name that is different from their code name, but few code names are as ungainly as “kumquat”.

The phone will apparently ship after Sony officially buries the “Ericsson” part of their branding; this is a move that was expected after Sony bought out Ericsson’s half of the joint venture. As a result the S-E Kumquat will come to market as the Sony Xperia U. The name still conjures up images of a college that specializes in mobile technology, but at least it’s consistent with the naming convention of the rest of the Xperia line.

The phone is expected to have a 3.5” 480x854 pixel screen, a “mid-range” 1GHz dual-core CPU, and a 5MP rear camera. The design aesthetic seems to match the larger Xperia S. While the Xperia U won’t pack quite as much under the hood as the Xperia S, the size may appeal more to people who want an iPhone-sized Android device.

Sony ST25i 'Kumquat' Xperia U Cool Smartphone Design MWC 2012 Launch?:

EU tells Sony that it can buy out Ericsson

According to Reuters, the EU has given Sony the green light to buy out its joint venture partner Ericsson. The terms of the deal, announced in October, call for Sony to pay 1.05 billion EUR ($1.47 billion USD) for Ericsson's half of the company. Sony will be using its name on new phones and even displayed some at the recent CES in Las Vegas, including the much talked about Sony Xperia S. The Japanese based company previously said that it would start removing Ericsson from handsets in the middle of this year at the same time that the split becomes final.

The joint venture's last quarterly earnings was indicative of the problems that led to the split. Sony Ericsson lost 207 million EUR in Q4 ($273.38 USD) and for the year was 247 million EUR in the red ($326.21 million USD). At CES, the Sony Xperia S and Sony Xperia ion were two of the most talked about smartphone models and the pair could help Sony get off to a good start with its new life as a solo player in the industry.

Sony Ericsson open sources its Android WebGL code

Sony Ericsson – soon to be just “Sony” – announced yesterday that they were releasing their home-brewed WebGL solution for Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) to the open source community. With luck that should drive broader adoption of WebGL by Android devices, and perhaps even serve as a template for other mobile operating systems.

What is WebGL and why should you care? WebGL is an implementation of OpenGL, a programming language for real time 3D graphics. WebGL provides to tools to support advanced 3D models and shading in a web browser. It has already found widespread adoption on desktop browsers (read: everyone but Internet Explorer), but the spread of WebGL to mobile devices has lagged.

Sony itself brought the first WebGL-enabled Android devices to market last year with its Xperia line of smartphones. Nokia’s N900 is so far the lone accomplice in the mobile WebGL world, although the major update to RIM’s Playbook is expected to add WebGL support, and mobile Firefox is testing WebGL as well.

Given the importance of web apps to some mobile developers, the spread of WebGL to other smartphones should lead to a new array of browser-based games and apps that make use of advanced 3D graphics. And to that end, Sony Ericsson’s choice to publish their WebGL implementation to the open source community may benefit us all.