Google Inc on Thursday unveiled its Nexus 5 smartphone, putting its premium brand on a device intended to champion the latest version of its Android operating system.
The hotly anticipated addition to Google’s Nexus line is powered by the new version of Android named KitKat, which was redesigned to work across the wide range of handsets built with the Internet titan’s free software included.
“Now you have one version of the Android operating system that can ship across all versions of smartphones in 2014,” said Sundar Pichai, head of the Android and Chrome teams, while providing a look at the new software and Nexus 5. “As we get on our way to reach the next billion people, we want to do it with the latest version of Android.”
The move aims to solve the problem that the wide variety of Android systems used around the world make it challenging for makers of fun, functional or hip smartphone or tablet apps to design programs that work on all devices.
Being stuck with old versions of Android also means that users do not get access to upgrades or improvements cranked out by Google.
Apple Inc executives routinely boast about how most users of its iPhone, iPad and iPod touch devices are on the latest version of iOS while many Android users are stuck with old versions.
Changes in KitKat included fine tuning it to work with the limited memory capacities of Android smartphones priced for markets in developing countries or other places where buyers are on tight budgets.
“It is important to us to get the same version of Android to scale across all versions of devices,” Pichai said.
Google partnered with South Korean consumer electronics giant LG Electronics Co to make the Nexus 5 smartphone to showcase the prowess of KitKat.
The Nexus 5 was available for purchase in 10 countries through the online store Google Play, priced at US$349 for a 16-gigabyte model and US$399 for a version with 32 gigabytes of memory.
KitKat was released to handset makers to begin building their own smartphones using the software, according to Pichai.
It is up to Android smartphone makers whether to push KitKat updates to people using their devices running on old versions of the operating system.
Google is both a rival and an ally to Android smartphone makers.
While Google has worked with partners to make Nexus brand smartphones for several years, its acquisition of Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc last year has made it a competitor in the handset hardware market.
Leading Android smartphone maker Samsung Electronics Co this week held its first developers conference to encourage creation of apps for its devices, particularly those powered by the South Korean consumer electronics company’s own Tizen software.
“Samsung is very much at odds with Google,” said analyst Tim Bajarin, president of Creative Strategies in Silicon Valley. “Samsung is only going to continue to win if they control their own destiny. If they have to rely on Google, their future is limited.”
Google, Apple and Microsoft Corp each control smartphone hardware and software to lure fans with mobile device “ecosystems” and Samsung likely intends to follow suit, the analyst said.
“Samsung will be in a tough place if they don’t end up controlling the operating system themselves,” Bajarin said. “Right now, they are beholden to Google.”
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day