Sanyo has agreed to sell its mobile phone business to rival Kyocera. The deal places the value of Sanyo’s phone business at ¥50 billion, but after figuring in debts and assets, the total transaction will net Sanyo about ¥40 billion, or around $375 million. Under the terms of the deal, Kyocera will roll its mobile operations into Sanyo’s North American mobile phone business, and also pick up some 2,000 Sanyo employees. The deal is scheduled to close April 1.
Tag Archive: Kyocera
Kyocera Wild Card Comes to Virgin Mobile
Fashion phone news flash: blade names are out, casino names are in. Witness the Samsung Blackjack and now its Virgin-Mobile-based competitor, the Kyocera Wild Card, which just appeared on the network. Like the Blackjack, the Kyocera sports a full QWERTY keyboard and a reasonable price, plus streaming music capability.
Based on the older Kyocera Switch_Back, the four-ounce phone has an LCD and ordinary numeric keypad on its outside face for voice use, but flips open sideways to reveal a wider screen and full keyboard for texting. Virgin Mobile customers will be able to take advantage of unlimited texting for $19.99 per month, or tap into Headliner – a resource for music information like tour dates and discography – for $2.49 per month. Streaming songs will be available for 25 cents apiece.
Alltel Shows Off New Kyocera Phones
Alltel, a cellular provider, and Kyocera today announced two new phones for users of the Alltel service. The Kyocera Slider Remix KX5, priced at $129.99 with a mail in rebate and two year service agreement, and the Kyocera Candid KX16, priced at $29.99 with a two year agreement, are both available now.
The Kyocera Slider Remix KX5 comes in a black handset and silver keypad combo which brings together the functions of a digital music player which plays MP3 and AAC music files and whose memory can be expanded, a 1.3 megapixel digital camera with built in flash and 5x digital zoom, video recorder functionality and wireless Bluetooth connectivity for hands free usage. The phone includes a color TFT display, pinwheel style user interface and a sliding faceplate.
Kyocera KX9 Review
Summary
Just because your friends can always reach you, doesn’t mean you want to be reached. Which is why the new Milan cell phone is perfect. With vertical, external caller ID, you can decide when and if to answer. Add to that speakerphone, polyphonic rings and enhanced text messaging, and you’ve got yourself one hot little number.
Kyocera Dorado KX13 Has Built-in Flashlight
The Kyocera Dorado KX13 features a built-in antenna, and an LED flashlight, something you rarely see on cell phones. Measuring 4.37 in. x 1.93 in. x .83 in. and weighing 3.7 ounces, the phone also includes standard features such as scheduler, calculator, alarm clock, stopwatch, tip calculator and a world clock.
So you might be asking yourself, why is this classified as an entry level cell phone? Well for starters the Dorado KX13 only runs on CDMA networks, and it does not feature more advanced features typically associated with Smartphones or PDA hybrids. The internal battery lasts for 3.8 hours, which is less than most phones currently available.
Kyocera to Outsource 80% Phone Production
“Kyocera Corp. has decided to outsource production of its CDMA handsets for the North American market to Flextronics International Ltd. As part of the plan, Kyocera Wireless Corp. (KWC), a Kyocera group company in the US, will sell its mobile phone manufacturing equipment and inventory in Mexico to Flextronics. The outsourcing of the production will enable KWC to focus more intently on R&D, design, sales and marketing. ”
Read more at Tech-On
Kyocera Terminates Contax Camera Line
Although Carl Zeiss and Kyocera have entered into a long term co-operation regarding the development, production and sale of CONTAX-branded cameras, Kyocera has decided to terminate such business due to difficulties in catching up with the recent rapid market changes.
Consequently, Kyocera will terminate the shipment of CONTAX-branded cameras, and the exclusive lenses and accessories in September, 2005, except for the CONTAX 645 camera system, the shipment of which to some markets will come to an end in December, 2005.
Kyocera will continue to provide after-sales services to its customers for their CONTAX- branded cameras, and the exclusive lenses and accessories over the maximum period of ten years within the specified time of each model.
Kyocera And Alienware Sign Into Agreement
The new relationship will match Kyocera Wireless’ reputation for making easy-to-use wireless handsets and accessories with Alienware’s ability to deliver robust gaming solutions for a wide variety ofplatforms, enabling a true gaming experience on Kyocera’s award-winning CDMA wireless phones.
“Kyocera Wireless recognizes that gaming on wireless phones is a rapidly growing market, driven not only by gamers who want a rich gaming experience on their handsets but also by our carrier customers’ desire to drive incremental revenue through game downloads,” said Noel Sobelman, accessories business segment director at Kyocera Wireless Corp. “To drive that revenue, the gaming experience on the phone needs to be as enjoyable as possible, enabled by bigger screens, better games and easy-to-use accessories. Alienware’s history and reputation in the gaming industry makes it an ideal company with which to co-develop gaming accessories that address this savvy and brand-loyal gamer audience using Kyocera phones.”
Kyocera Launches Battery Recall
This recall is limited solely to cell phone batteries, as there are no defects with the Kyocera phones.
Kyocera Wireless Corp.’s (KWC’s) stringent ongoing quality control processes revealed that a battery supplier, since terminated, intentionally provided KWC with batteries containing unapproved battery cells, the internal power sources within the batteries. The supplier’s deceit resulted in fraudulent batteries shipping with Kyocera phones and being sold as accessories. Upon deeper investigation, KWC discovered that despite terminating the supplier’s services, the supplier continued to make the fraudulent batteries and sold them into the gray (after) market. These counterfeits feature Kyocera’s logo and are designed to look identical to legitimate Kyocera-approved batteries. Since the supplier is headquartered in the U.S., KWC is actively working with the United States Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) and Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to locate these counterfeit batteries, prosecute those involved and ensure they do not reach consumers.
Kyocera SL300RT Review
Summary
The CONTAX SL300R T* is equipped with the ”Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar T* 5.8-17.4mm F2.8-4.7,”( *1) a 3x optical zoom lens developed by Carl Zeiss, and provides clear image thanks to the T* coating applied to the lens surface. The adoption of Kyocera¡Çs proprietary image processing system ”RTUNE” also enables full-memory, consecutive shooting at around 3.5 frames/second and fine color gradation with a reduction in noise. The 16-mm-thick full-flat body makes the camera highly portable when not in use. Rotating the lens section for shooting offers free choice of camera angles and easy framing. The magnesium die-cast body also features easy-to-hold genuine leather coverings on the front casing. A filter can be attached by using the special hood and adapter on the front of the lens. (*1) Equivalent to around 38-115mm on a 35-mm camera.
