Hasta La Gadget!

Softbank and Sprint have been on pins and needles ever since January, when the US Department of Justice asked the FCC to delay the carriers’ merger as it scrutinized the deal over national security concerns. The two networks can breathe a little easier this weekend, as the DOJ just dropped its request for more time. There’s “no objection” to the acquisition following a review, the agency says. Not that the companies are completely out of the woods: the FCC has to approve the buyout, and there’s still the small matters of Dish’s bids for both Sprint and Clearwire. Softbank may not want to drop its backup plan just yet.

Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless, Mobile, Sprint

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Via: Computerworld

Source: FCC (PDF)

Dish’s interesting attempt to acquire its way into the wireless data business has taken another turn this evening, thanks to a new development in its bid for Clearwire. Dish upped its offer to $4.40 per share for all of the company’s outstanding shares earlier this week, and the Clearwire board seems interested. Originally scheduled to take place Friday morning, the meeting is now set for June 13th so the board can discuss Dish’s offer, and how it compares to Sprint’s $2.2 billion / $3.40 per share bid for the 50 percent of Clearwire it does not yet own. The new bid is apparently more “actionable” than Dish’s previous proposal, and could also complicate Softbank’s attempt to acquire Sprint which Dish is also trying to intercept. Hit the links below for all the business details while we wait for the various bords and committees to figure out what happens to these companies next.

Filed under: Wireless, Mobile, Sprint

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AC adapters aren’t something you really pay that much attention to, but if you do have a lot of cables running and you wish that your AC adapters looked a bit better, you might want to consider moving to Japan because Japanese company, Softbank, has announced their plans to release the “itomaki AC Adapter” which as you can see pictured above, certainly does not look like your run of the mill AC adapter. This adapter has been designed for smart devices in mind, which we guess is pretty obvious based on its micro USB connector.

There will be a couple of versions of the adapter, one for smartphones/tablets that charge via micro USB, and one for the iPhone and iPad which will feature the Lightning connector. The adapter has been designed to resemble a spool of thread and is apparently based on the concept of “Japanese Simplicity”. They are admittedly pretty cool and if you wanted to add a bit of color to your home, we guess these adapters should do the trick.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Portable Water Filter Powered By Nanomaterials, Adobe Mighty Pen Stylus And Napoleon Ruler,

Five-inch smartphones with 1080p displays aren’t uncommon now, but Sharp‘s new AQUOS Phone Xx SoftBank 206SH does have one advantage: enough battery life to get it through a promised two full days. The new handset, part of Japanese carrier SoftBank’s Summer 2013 line-up, uses a combination of old and new tech to help subscribers skip the overnight charge, with a huge battery paired with a clever CG Silicon TFT LCD display.

On the old-tech side, Sharp squeezes a massive 3,080 mAh battery into the 5-inch phone, only slightly smaller than the pack Samsung fits to the larger Galaxy Note II. With Sharp’s “Eco Tech” settings enabled – which seems to involve throttling the 1.7GHz Snapdragon S4 Pro quadcore processor (APQ8064) at times – the phone will supposedly last through two days of use.

However, the CG Silicon display also weighs in with some improvements of its own, using continuous grain silicon for the backplane rather than the amorphous silicon more traditionally found in LCD TFT panels. That, Sharp says, makes for a thinner and better-performing display, with higher quality graphics and reduced power consumption.

Interestingly, Sharp sees CG Silicon technology as a way to eventually build an entire computer on a single sheet of glass, in effect creating smartphones and mobile devices that were one, fused gadget rather than a selection of sandwiched individual parts. Exactly when that will be feasible remains to be seen, however; Sharp has created demo rigs with processors embedded into the substrate, but commercial applications haven’t been begun yet.

Instead, we get the 206SH and the 5-inch, 443ppi display Sharp showed off at CEATEC last year. Since then, the company has slapped on a touchscreen layer, of course, though the smaller number of overall layers should still pay dividends on display visibility.

Sharp has a track record of trialling new panel technology in devices for the Japanese market. Last year, the company released the AQUOS TAB SHT21, a 7-inch Android tablet using an IGZO display rather than LCD TFT or OLED. IGZO promises either roughly twice the runtime as an LCD panel at the same brightness, or as much as twice the brightness for outdoor usability, though manufacturing yields have meant the tech is yet to comprehensively spread.

The Sharp AQUOS Phone Xx SoftBank 206SH will go on sale in late June. It has a 13.1-megapixel camera with f/1.9 optics, 1-Seg digital TV, LTE, and runs Android 4.2, while wireless options include WiFi a/b/g/n/ac and Bluetooth 4.0 along with infrared. It’s also waterproof, and will be offered with a desktop dock for charging and entertainment use.

Sharp AQUOS 206SH debuts 5″ CG-S 1080p display and two day battery is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
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We’re sure you guys might have heard that Japanese carrier, Softbank, is looking to acquire a majority stake in one of the major US carriers, Sprint. At the same time it seems that American company, Dish, could be interested as well and seems to be thinking about making a counter-offer of their own. Dish even goes as far as saying that their acquisition of Sprint could be better for national security. In any case it would seem that Softbank might have stumbled across a hurdle, but at the same time it looks like the Japanese carrier may have found themselves an ally in the form of Intel’s CEO, Paul Otellini, who in an email sent to FCC chairman, claims that he supports Softbank.

According to the email, Otellini was quoted as saying, “Son-san’s vision to build a high speed competitive third national network is very compelling […] We need this competition in the wireless space as the ATT / Verizon model is not giving that to consumers at this time.” We’re not sure if Otellini’s message of support will play a role in helping the regulatory bodies decide if this acquisition should be allowed to happen, so we guess we will just have to wait and see.

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