Tag archive: Sony Ericsson

It was back in October last year that Sony announced it would be buying long-term ally Ericsson out of the partnership, ending one of the most enduring collaborations in the mobile industry, and subsequently going-it-alone. Today marks the end of that era, as according to a short press release, the money has changed hands and the deal has been completed. How much money? A total of 1.05 billion euro, which converts to around $1.3 billion or £870… Read More

Sony Ericsson has announced a limited edition of its Xperia Active smartphone, after teaming up with extreme sports clothing brand Billabong. The Xperia Active Billabong edition comes with a redesigned rear panel, plus a wealth of branded material stored on the phone, such as wallpapers, videos, screensavers and a special surf game. The phone remains the same as the standard Active, with Android 2.3 Gingerbread (although the Active will be… Read More

In just over one month's time, the doors will open at Mobile World Congress 2012, one of the largest mobile industry trade shows in the world. Held in Barcelona, Spain, the exhibition center will play host to more than 1400 exhibitors and last year attracted 60,000 visitors. The reason Mobile World Congress is so eagerly anticipated by mobile fans around the world is that traditionally, manufacturers use it to unveil their very latest… Read More

When you're a phone geek it's easy to get tied up with thoughts of 4-inch-plus touchscreens, big megapixel cameras and multi-core processsors; effectively forgetting the low-end of the market entirely. The truth is though, feature phones are still out there and they're selling at an astonishing rate. This morning, Nokia announced the sale of its 1.5 billionth Series 40 feature phone, and that it's still selling 12 similar… Read More

Information has come to light suggesting that electronics giant Sony will be releasing around 11 smartphones this year, all running Android. The leaked information, obtained by GSM Arena, lists the names of 11 phones, together with the expected launch dates for each, and their prices in Indian rupees. Indian rupees? Yes, GSM Arena reports the information as being “allegedly leaked through Sony's sales report in India.” In the chart below,… Read More

Sony Ericsson had already announced they'll be bringing the latest version of Android to their 2011 range of Xperia phones, but hadn't gone as far to say when this would happen. Today though, they've published a post on their official blog giving a basic schedule for the rollout. The upgrade to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich will be a split into two stages. Beginning in late March and continuing into early April, the Xperia… Read More

A new smartphone from Sony Ericsson has been revealed through its Bluetooth certification entry, and rather than being another for the European networks, it's listed as a North American model only. The LT28at will be coming to AT&T and will connect to their LTE high-speed network. While it's not the first phone to be leaked via Bluetooth's site, the blurb features an unusually high level of detail. Described as a… Read More

With Android Ice Cream Sandwich only officially available on the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, there are sure to be plenty of Android fans who want to get a glimpse of the new version running on a different phone. Sony Ericsson has come to the rescue with this demonstration video, showing an early build running on an Xperia Arc S. The company recently announced they would be releasing an Ice Cream Sandwich update for their 2011 range of Xperia-branded… Read More

Sony announced its intention to buy its way out of its 50/50 joint phone venture with Ericsson around the end of October. The Japanese company will pay Ericsson about $1.5 billion dollars so that it can begin branding its smartphones solely as Sony products. From the looks of it, the brand change will happen fairly soon. According to a Sony executive speaking with The Times of India, the Sony Ericsson brand will be phased out by the middle of… Read More

Hot on the heels of the announcement of Sony buying out Ericsson to own the phone company outright Sony makes a bombshell announcement. Howard Stringer, Sony’s president and CEO, said today “We’re phasing out feature phones.” Stringer has yet to outline exactly how quickly the phasing out process will take. With smartphone prices dropping every day it seems as though it’s only a matter of time until every phone on the market will be a… Read More

Sweden-based telecommunications giant Ericsson announced today that Sony will buy out its 50 percent stake in the Sony Ericsson mobile phone business for $1.47 billion. The deal will give Sony complete ownership of Sony Ericsson. As part of the deal, Sony will acquire “five essential patent families relating to wireless handset technology” from Ericsson, according to the press release. Sony will also now have the opportunity to… Read More

The Xperia Play doesn't seem to be taking off (it's had a price cut and Sony isn't releasing numbers), but don't blame Kristen Shaal. The comedian–who you may know from Flight of the Conchords or The Daily Show–has appeared in a few ads for Sony Ericsson's PlayStation phone, and they're all pretty funny. In the latest one, released last week, she celebrates Minecraft coming to the Play by… Read More

The partnership between Sony and Ericsson has always been a precarious one for consumers. While almost everyone knows the name Sony, few outside the tech industry recognize the Ericsson brand these days. With sales down and its foothold in the U.S. market almost nonexistent, Sony may finally be planning to exit the partnership that helped it establish a foothold in the mobile world 10 years ago. The WSJ reports that Sony has almost finalized a… Read More

Sony Ericsson is bringing back the Walkman music phone, this time powered by Android 2.3 (Gingerbread). Oddly, storing and playing music doesn't seem to be the focus of the phone at all, despite being called the “Live with Walkman.” The new phone has only 320MB of internal storage and a 2GB SD card. You won't be able to fit much music on it.  “Live with” appear to be the key words here. A Sony Ericsson press… Read More

The PlayStation phone may already be on its way out. Today, Verizon cut the price of the Sony Ericsson phone from $200 to $100 with a two-year contract (via Phandroid). Despite having graphics that exceed the Sony PSP, running Android 2.3 Gingerbread, and featuring a complete slide-out Sony gamepad, the Xperia Play may not be selling well. While phone prices often drop within six months and many phones don't even stay on the market longer… Read More