Hasta La Gadget!

It was rumored recently that Sprint is interested in acquiring T-Mobile, having Magenta’s user base and infrastructure onboard would allow Sprint to launch a much more effective competition against rivals Verizon and AT&T. While AT&T pursued its own buyout bid for T-Mobile, it could get through due to regulatory concerns. It remains to be seen how far Sprint is able to go in this rumored bid for T-Mobile, but apparently its Chairman, who also happens to be the CEO of Softbank which purchased Sprint, is meeting to banks to advise and finance the T-Mobile acquisition.

Masayoshi Son, the gentleman we’re talking about in this article, has discussed financing with banks like Mizuho, Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase and Credit Suisse Group, people “familiar with the matter” tell Bloomberg. These are the very same financial institutions that advised and financed SoftBank’s buyout of Sprint. Apparently the chairman and CEO is looking to raise $20 billion, and take control of T-Mobile by paying cash for the 67 percent stake in Magenta that’s owned by Deutsche Telekom. According to the report, while Deutsche Telekom and Sprint haven’t sat down as yet, apparently the former is willing to sell its stake for around $16 billion. According to the sources, discussions with the banks are in initial stages, but so far it appears that financing is available for this deal.

Sprint Chairman Approaching Banks To Secure Funding For T-Mobile Acquisition original content from Ubergizmo.

A couple of days back T-Mobile CEO tweeted that an uncarrier 4.0 announcement is going to be made soon. Throughout this year the carrier has made a number of “uncarrier” announcements which radically changed the way T-Mobile does business. With the first announcement T-Mobile stopped requiring subscribers to sign a conventional two year service contract, it also unveiled its Jump! program which lets them upgrade their smartphones without having to worry about eligibility. Another daring announcement was 2G global unlimited data roaming at no extra cost. Uncarrier 4.0 which is apparently internally referred to as Project Houdini will reportedly cover ETF or early termination fees for people switching over to T-Mobile from other carriers.

It is claimed that T-Mobile will position this new deal towards families with up to five lines of service, giving them instant credits for the smartphones from their previous carriers that they trade-in. When T-Mobile receives a copy of their final bill, it would issue credit to cover the early termination fees that the other carrier charges. The maximum credit for smartphones is said to be $350 and for feature phones it is said to be $200. While the folks at TmoNews have two sources who claim that Project Houdini exists, no official announcement has been made by T-Mobile as yet. They haven’t even given a hint of what uncarrier 4.0 is. An official announcement is rumored for January 15th, so we’ll just have to wait until then to be absolutely sure.

T-Mobile’s Project ‘Houdini’ Will Reportedly Cover ETF Fee For People Switching Carriers original content from Ubergizmo.

Over the past couple of weeks the Android 4.3 update has been released for a number of Samsung devices, primarily those that have already been succeeded by newer models. The update is important in the sense that it brings support for the company’s new smartwatch, Galaxy Gear. After having been released for the Sprint and AT&T variants, today Verizon Galaxy Note 2 Android 4.3 update has been released which finally adds support for the smartwatch to Big Red’s version of the popular phablet.

Apart from support for the smartwatch, this update comes with all of the goodies that users expect from Android 4.3 Jelly Bean. A number of preinstalled applications from Samsung are also included in the update, and so is the Samsung Knox enterprise security suite. The update also makes improvements to the music player, S Voice, camera and more. Verizon Galaxy Note 2 Android 4.3 update weighs in around 700MB, its a hefty download, once you’ll definitely want to start on a strong Wi-Fi connection. Verizon is rolling out the update over the air, by now it should have gone live in almost all regions. Those who haven’t received the update notification as yet on their Galaxy Note 2 units can try manually requesting the update through the “Update” button in the Settings app.

Verizon Galaxy Note 2 Android 4.3 Update Brings Galaxy Gear Support original content from Ubergizmo.

NASA’s Curiosity rover has been on Mars for over a year now, and in the time has traversed nearly three miles. While its wheels are made of high-grade aluminum, they’re not strong enough to last forever. NASA announced this week it was taking an extra-long look at the wheels, and boy are they in rough shape.

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Welcome to Time Machines, where we offer up a selection of mechanical oddities, milestone gadgets and unique inventions to test out your tech-history skills. In the week’s leading up to the biggest gadget show on Earth, we’ll be offering a special …