UK retailers will finally get the Sony Xperia Z2 in May

The European launch of the new Sony Xperia Z2 flagship was pushed from mid-April to May and May is fast approaching. UK retailers have started lining it up to launch.

Sony's official web site claims deliveries are expected to start at the beginning of May. Carphone Warehouse warns of limited pre-launch stock but expects to have the Xperia Z2 in its stores on right on May 1.

That's ahead of Clove UK's goal of shipping on May 9. Clove's offer includes £200 of free stuff – a Sony SRS-BTM8 Bluetooth speaker, MDR-NC31EM noise-cancelling headphones, 6 digital movie downloads and 30 days of Sony Music Unlimited.

Carrier EE has set the delivery date "within 28 days," while Vodafone is still claiming April 14 (which clearly didn’t pan out).

We tried checking elsewhere in Europe, the most accurate shipping date info we could find was "in 4-6 weeks" (one store even had a warning "shipping date unknown").

The Canadian launch will also happen in May, while the US launch won't happen at all with carriers (Sony will be offering it through its own store though).

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EU takes action to reduce smartphone patent wars

The European Commission made a landmark ruling on Tuesday regarding an infringement claim by Motorola against Apple regarding the use of a standard-essential patent it had licensed.

The Commission decreed that smartphone and tablet makers could no longer seek injunctions against rivals they had signed patent licensing agreements with, a step that should significantly reduce patent wars within the confines of the EU.

In light of the numerous legal disputes with rival manufacturer Apple, the EU's anti-trust enforcement office has also accepted an agreement from Samsung Electronics not to seek injunctions against rivals it currently licenses patents from. The Commission also ordered Motorola to resolve its legal disputes with the Cupertino company outside of the courtrooms through arbitration.

Jaoquin Almunia, the European commissioner in charge of anti-trust enforcement, said decisively that patent wars should not come at the expense of consumers.

"While patent holders should be fairly remunerated for the use of their intellectual property, implementers of such standards should also get access to standardized technology on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms."

The ruling sets a precedent that will likely be imposed on other manufacturers looking to pursue legal action against rivals within EU member countries. This should hamper the likes of Samsung and Apple, currently suing each other in more than 10 countries, from further widespread litigation - at least in the confines of the EU.

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Nokia unveils Q1 results: phone division sales take a hit

Nokia posted an operating profit of €304 million (11.4% of net sales) in the first quarter of this year, up from €254 million (8.1% of net sales) for the same quarter.

This will be the last but one quarter with the phone division on Nokia's books – it spent the month of April with the Finns, but as of a few days ago it's part of Microsoft. This may be sad news for fans, but financially it's good news for Nokia.

The phone division (now labeled "discontinued operations"), brought in €1.93 billion with an operating loss of €326 million. That's a decline in sales from €2.77 billion, but an increase in loss from €120 million.

Nokia's Continuing operations totaled €2.67 billion with an operating profit of €242 million. Most of the cash came from Nokia Networks - €2.33 billion (17% down from €2.8 billion in the year ago quarter).

HERE brought in €209 million in revenue (down from €216 million a year ago) with an operating profit of €10 million. Technologies raked in €131 million with an operating profit of €86 million (at a high operating margin of 65.6%).

The sale of Nokia's Devices & services division closed at a price of €5.44 billion, €170 million higher than the initial price. The Indian plant whose fate was uncertain will remain with Nokia. Nokia will produce phones for Microsoft there.

Nokia's cash and other liquid assets declined €2.3 billion over the past year, largely due to debt facilities of €1.8 billion in Q1 this year. If Nokia had sold its Devices & services division prior to Q1, gross cash would have totaled €10.5 billion, rather than the €6.9 billion it is now.

Also, Nokia is welcoming a new President and CEO - Rajeev Suri.

Hit the source link for more detailed numbers.

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LG Q1 2014 results show 12.3 million smartphones sold

LG's financial report for Q1 2014 is out and things are looking good for the Korean company as it managed to ship 12.3 million smartphones for the period. That's a 19% increase compared to the same quarter of 2013 and helped LG's mobile division to ramp up its revenue to KRW3.41 trillion ($3.19 billion) - a 6% YoY increase.

Out of the 12.3 million smartphones, 5 million were LTE-enabled, which is the highest the company has sold in a quarter so far.

Additionally, the financial results press release points to the launch of the upcoming LG G3 in Q2. Not only did it confirm the name of the phone, but it also confirmed the launch of more L-series III smartphones.

We saw the LG G3 leak in an exclusive picture sent to us by a tipster. The rear-mounted keys are here to stay and the phone is rumored to pack 3GB of RAM and a 5.5" QHD display. We also saw a bunch of screenshot depicting the phone's latest Optimus UI with a flatter design.

Overall, the company's Q1 net profit marks a 319% yearly increase - to KRW92.60 billion ($86.62 million). The consolidated first-quarter revenues are KRW 14.27 trillion (USD 13.35 billion). Compared to the same quarter in 2013, that's a 1.2% increase.

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Samsung Galaxy S5 Neo leaks again, 5.1-inch display in tow

The Samsung device that goes by the model number SM-G750 has popped up again on an Indian import database site Zauba. We've seen the model number before and speculations suggest it could turn out be the Galaxy S5 Neo. In its previous leak it sported a screen resolution of 720 x 1280 pixels and an 2.3 GHz CPU.

Though the new leak we gather some new information - the screen size is slated as a 5.1" - the same as the Galaxy S5. The SM-G750 is listed as SM-G750A, SM-G750F and SM-G750H - probably regional options for different markets.

Previously it was though the SM-G750 is the Galaxy S5 mini but that goes by the name of SM-G800 and sports a .

Sadly that's all the info we get at this point. Hopefully the Galaxy S5 Neo goes official and we get some solid information soon.

Source | Via (in Dutch)

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Samsung's Q1 2014 results reveal a net profit of $8.2billion

Samsung released its 1 2014 earnings report. In line with the earnings guidance from earlier this month, the Korean giant posted a net profit of 8.5 trillion won ($8.2 billion) from 53.68 trillion won ($51.8 billion) of revenue.

The company’s net profit took a 3% dip compared to the same period last year. Samsung attributed the second straight fall of quarterly profit to a weakness in the market for flat-screen panels and maturing high-end smartphone segment.

Samsung’s mobile division raked in an operating profit of 6.43 trillion Won ($6.2 billion USD) for the quarter. The number is down 1.2% from a year ago, but 18% up compared to the previous quarter.

Unsurprisingly, Samsung Galaxy S5 is expected to lead increased demand over next quarter, despite continued weak seasonality. Samsung expects its current flagship to outsell its predecessor, the Galaxy S4.

Going forward, Samsung expects its profits to increase in the next quarter thanks to improved sales of display panels and home appliances. The upcoming World Cup in Brazil is expected to be a major sales booster for the company.

Source | Via

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Samsung announces the Galaxy K zoom camera phone

Samsung has officially announced the Galaxy K zoom camera phone, the successor to the Galaxy S4 zoom launched last year. Like its predecessor, the Galaxy K zoom combines a regular smartphone with the hardware of a point and shoot camera.

On the camera-side, the Galaxy K zoom has a 20.7 megapixel 1/2.3 BSI CMOS sensor and a 10x, 24-240mm F3.1-6.3 zoom lens with optical image stabilization (OIS). The phone has a xenon flash with an LED autofocus assist. On the front is a relatively humble 2 megapixel camera.

On the smartphone side, the Galaxy K zoom has a 4.8-inch, 1280x720 resolution Super AMOLED display, Exynos 5 Hexa SoC with six CPU cores comprising of four 1.3GHz ARM Cortex A7 and two 1.7GHz ARM Cortex A15; along with a Mali-T624 GPU, 2GB RAM, 8GB internal memory with microSD support (up to 64GB), LTE, Bluetooth 4.0, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, NFC, 2,430mAh battery and Android 4.4 KitKat.

The Galaxy K zoom will be available in black, white and blue.

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