Hasta La Gadget!

Card slots. A bottle opener. Pepper spray. Defense against a .50 caliber bullet. Whatever you might need on the go, people are thinking of ways for you to integrate it right into your iPhone case.

But Y Combinator startup Graft Concepts is trying to cover all your basic needs with one case, using a simple latched frame and interchangeable backplates. Named Leverage, the case’s frame alone is meant to be a bumper for the phone and comes with either a plain backplate for $40 or a card holder (which fits about five cards) for $50. Additional backplates range from $7 to $30 based on design and material.

The idea behind Graft Concepts is to offer easy installation and removal, functionality and a complement to the iPhone’s sleek design. Inspired by watch clasps, the metal latch lets you fit the frame around the phone and then click it into place to avoid any damage from snapping or pulling the case. Co-founder Anthony Ko describes the product as “a Swiss army knife” for iPhone cases, because users can switch out backplates to suit their current needs.

“People’s complaints weren’t being addressed, like phones being damaged from their cases and being really difficult to take off. So that’s how the quick-release mechanism was developed,” co-founder Peter Szucs tells me. “Because of the way we do it — we’re just swapping out the backplate — we can offer it for less so people can buy more sorts of backplates.”

The founders of Graft Concept say the smartphone accessories business is a $20 billion market. But there are many other companies that are either dominant in, or trying to enter, the same space, including OtterBox, Case-Mate and Cygnett.

Known for its thick and protective casing, OtterBox is a main competitor in the iPhone case space. As my first and only iPhone case, the OtterBox has kept my phone well intact, but is a little too clunky for my taste sometimes. The white material of the standard case also makes it really hard to clean, which has been driving me crazy.

OtterBox’s key feature is also something that Graft Concepts isn’t necessarily focused on — protection. As someone who is prone to dropping things, this is my foremost concern. Although the Leverage case has passed drop tests for protection, the thin frame is nowhere near as hefty or reassuring as my OtterBox. But Szucs tells me Graft Concepts is more about functionality and design.

The founders are focusing on personal customization by opening up ideas to the design and 3D community. Graft Concepts has partnered with several sites to offer customization options for backplates, so customers will be able to design their own with Zazzle and COLOURlovers. The company also offers files for 3D printing backplates that work as kickstands and bicycle mounts. Graft Concepts is also working on backplates with a headphone cord wrap and a battery pack.

The company has sold 45,000 cases and is in talks with several retail stores.

Note: The title of this post is an exaggeration. But not by much, and that matters.

The monthly Windows Phone report from the AdDuplex group is out for August, and is essentially a repeat of July’s figures: The Lumia 520 is crushing other Windows Phone handsets, and Nokia is quickly becoming the de facto OEM of the platform as HTC slips.

Nokia moved from 85 percent market share of Windows Phone hardware in July, to 86.9 percent in August. Rounding that to 87 percent, we can say it gained two points in a month. At this pace, Nokia will quickly consume the small slice of the Windows Phone platform that it does not control.

And, as AdDuplex notes, the Lumia 1020 is outselling the also recently released Lumia 928, meaning that, most likely, Nokia’s sales are accelerating. Given that, it isn’t outside the realm of possibility that Nokia could expand the pace at which it grows its share of Windows Phone over the next few months — the Lumia 520 continues to grow in secondary markets, and the Lumia 1020 is attacking the U.S. market with fresh vigor following a $100 price cut.

Who else builds Windows Phone handsets? HTC, sorta. HTC slipped from 11.5 percent market share in July to 9.8 percent in August, which almost mirrors Nokia’s gains. At what point does HTC essentially not matter in market share? Five percent? If so, it’s three months away from that point. That’s before the holidays.

Total Windows Phone handset shipments are expanding. The platform could conceivably ship 10 million units in the fourth quarter. However, unless something dramatic changes in the Windows Phone market, and quickly, those fourth-quarter devices will likely be from the Nokia Lumia family.

Good or bad? That Windows Phone is expanding is catnip to Microsoft, but declining platform support is dangerous. Windows Phone is now more dependent on Nokia’s health than ever before. Therefore, Microsoft’s mobile efforts are fully dependent on Nokia’s action. This is disconcerting, given how expensive and important the Windows Phone effort is to Microsoft.

The argument that Microsoft might buy Nokia did not make sense when it was among a cadre of other OEMs, all bustling to build devices for Windows Phone. That’s all but over as eras go. And that makes Nokia a singular, potential fail-point for Windows Phone. Yikes.

Top Image Credit: Vernon Chan

If engraving a personalized Moto X with Moto Maker’s “signature” feature was at the top of your to-do list, you’ll have to put your plans on ice. Motorola’s just told us that the custom inscribing will be available at some point in the future, though it’s not sure when that might be. At any rate, fashionistas will still be able to give their hardware custom paint jobs right on time.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile

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Apple is going to ship new iPhones next month – two different new variants, including a “low-end” and a “high-end” variant, according to a new Wall Street Journal report today. At this stage, we’ve seen lots to suggest that Apple would indeed announce two versions of the iPhone at its rumored event on September 10, but the WSJ makes it a pretty sure bet.

The WSJ doesn’t get into specifics about what we’ll see from new iPhones, but it’s likely that we’ll get the iPhone 5S, which would follow in the footsteps of the iPhone 5 with a metal body similar to the previous design (with a new double-flash for the camera and higher specs), as well as an iPhone 5C with a rear plastic case in multiple colors (likely very similar to the leaks from Sonny Dickson (source for image above) we’ve been seeing recently). I’d say both the names are subject to change, but the material details are essentially a known quantity at this point.

We also know that there will almost certainly be a new gold colorway for the iPhone 5S, as reported by TechCrunch this weekend and confirmed by AllThingsD earlier today. A ship date of later in September would also be in keeping with the timing of previous iPhone launches, where hardware typically hits consumer shelves a maximum of two weeks after the announcement.

Two new iPhones at once would seem to represent a new level of difficulty for Apple’s supply chain, but frequently-accurate analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said earlier today that Apple could replace the iPhone 5 entirely with the iPhone 5C (or whatever it ends up being called), making it likely that a lot of the production processes from that device would be shifted into place for the low-cost variant.

Apple’s event will likely have company in terms of announcements from rival Samsung, so expect a busy September all around.

In 2011, a United Nations commission came to a powerful conclusion: access to broadband internet is a basic human right, matched by the likes of housing, sustenance and healthcare. Arguments can be made that widespread access has transformed entire economies while kick-starting others, with Finland even going so far as to command its ISPs to provide 1 Mbps connections to all homes regardless of location. Both the United States and the United Kingdom have similarly ambitious plans, and all three of these countries have one particular catalyst in common: funds.

The harsh reality, however, is the economies that stand to gain the most from sweeping internet adoption are also the least equipped to enable it. In early 2010, the European Bank estimated that a project to roll out passive optical fiber to 33 cities in the Netherlands would cost nearly €290 million. The mission driving such funding? “To stimulate innovation and keep Europe at the forefront of internet usage.” It’s the answer to a problem that could undoubtedly be categorized as “first world,” but consider this: Internet World Stats found that 92.9 percent of The Netherlands’ population routinely used the world wide web in 2012. Let’s just say it’s easier to invest in an initiative that you’re certain nearly 9 in 10 citizens will use.

In the whole of Africa, just 15.6 percent of residents are connected to the internet, which is under half of the world average. It’s also home to vast, inhospitable landscapes that are economically inviable to crisscross with fiber. All of that being said, nearly a sixth of the globe’s population resides on the continent, representing a monumental opportunity for something — anything — to connect the next billion people. As it turns out, there are actions presently ongoing to make a significant mark in the course of history. Google, Microsoft, Carlson Wireless, Tertiary Education and Research Network of South Africa (TENET) and a host of other powerful entities are collaborating to bring high-speed internet to an underserved continent via TV white spaces — a low-cost, highly adaptable technology that’s poised to explode. For now, Cape Town, South Africa, is acting as a proving ground for what will eventually be a far larger experiment. The core goal is actually quite simple: to beam hope to a disconnected society, with unused bands between TV channels acting as the medium. %Gallery-slideshow67067%

Filed under: Networking, Internet, Mobile, Google

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