By Edward Lim
When my trusty Google Pixel froze last week, I took it as a case of overuse and attempted a reboot. It proved to be a series of fruitless attempts as the Android-based smartphone simply could not be revived. The furthest I got was to the opening screen (see above) but there was absolutely nothing I could do there — the screen just froze again before launching into another reboot. Continue reading “The day my Google Pixel died”
By CY Lim
The OnePlus 6T has been out in the market for a couple of months now and as one who received it as a gift within the first few days of its launch, I am definitely glad I made the switch from my sluggish Oppo A77. Setting up and transferring data was a breeze especially since it was an intra-Android migration. Within an hour or so, I was ready to go. Continue reading “OnePlus 6T: Impressive, nifty and fun”
Worldwide shipment of wearable devices will touch 225 million in 2019, an increase of 25.8 percent from 2018, according to Gartner. Continue reading “Global wearable market to grow 26% in 2019”
Smartphone vendors shipped 355.2 million units in Q3, down six percent from the corresponding quarter last year, according to preliminary estimates by IDC. This is the fourth straight quarter of year-on-year decline.
Continue reading “Global smartphone shipment slides 6% in Q3”
Xiaomi and Samsung shipped 9.9 million smartphones each to India in Q2. Together they account for 60 percent of the total shipment that quarter, according to Canalys.
Continue reading “Samsung and Xiaomi neck-to-neck in India in Q2”
Global traditional PC shipment posted the strongest growth in more than six years during the past quarter, according to IDC. Total shipment was 62.3 million units, which translates to a 2.7 percent year-on-year growth.
Smart speakers are picking up steam with the installed base expected to hit 100 million by the end of this year, according to Canalys. That’s 2.5 times the size of end 2017.
China has emerged tops with five out of 19 winners in the 2018 IDC Smart City Asia Pacific Awards (SCAPA). Taiwan and Singapore were next with four and three awards respectively across 12 functional categories.
Banking led professional services, manufacturing, telecommunications and government to contribute more than 80 percent to overall external storage market in India in Q1, according to IDC India. The quarter saw a jump of 12.7 percent year-on-year to US$84.1 million.
Continue reading “Banking spend drives external storage Q1 growth in India”
The worldwide wearables market is adjusting as smartwatches continue to come to the forefront. In the coming years, smartwatches will encompass more features and functionalities.
Continue reading “Smartwatch market heading towards steady growth”
Dell EMC turned in a stellar performance in Q1 by growing 51.4 percent in server revenue, enabling it to widen the gap with second-place Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) which nevertheless grew an impressive 21.5 percent.
Continue reading “Dell EMC widens lead on HPE as worldwide server revenue grew 33.4% in Q1”
China smartphone makers Huawei and Xiaomi grew strongest as the market recovered in Q1, according to Gartner.
Continue reading “Huawei and Xiaomi lead smartphone growth in Q1”
Power efficient chipsets are set to be the main driver as artificial intelligence (AI) moves makes a significant shift from the cloud to the edge, according to ABI Research.
Continue reading “Power efficient chipsets to drive edge AI”
Information and communications technology (ICT) spending in Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan) will hit US$1.5 trillion in 2021, according to IDC.
Continue reading “ICT spending in APAC (sans Japan) to hit US$1.5t in 2021”
Google has ousted Amazon from the perch of the global smart speaker market. According to Canalys, Google shipped 3.2 million units with its Google Home and Google Home mini series , surpassing the 2.5 million units of the Amazon Echo series for the first time in Q1.
Continue reading “Google moves to top of smart speaker market in Q1”
The India smartphone market shipped 30 million units in Q1, the strongest Q1 performance ever and an 11-percent growth year on year, according to IDC.
Continue reading “India smartphone market posts strongest Q1 shipment”
ABI Research expects eight million consumer vehicles shipping in 2025 will feature SAE Level 3 and 4 technologies, where drivers will still be necessary but are able to completely shift safety-critical functions to the vehicle under certain conditions, and SAE Level 5 technology, where no driver will be required at all.
The downward trend continues for worldwide PC shipment with a 1.4 percent drop in Q1, making it the 14th consecutive quarter of decline, according to Gartner.
Virtual reality (VR) has been tipped to be the next innovative technology to improve and impact retail and marketing.
India has become the fastest growing smartphone market in the world with total shipment growing 14 percent to 124 million units in 2017, according to IDC.
Continue reading “India is fastest growing smartphone market in 2017”
How the watch industry has changed! As a show of its strength and popularity, Apple Watch has taken the crown, not just among smartwatches, but outselling the entire Swiss watch industry in Q4. Now, that’s quite an accomplishment!
For the past few years, data scientists are highly sought after to analyse data that can help organisations better understand their business, customers and trends. But, it looks like artificial intelligence-based solutions may be taking over that role in the near future.
Global IT spending is expected to grow to US$3.7 trillion in 2018, an increase of 4.5 percent from 2017, according to Gartner.
Continue reading “Global IT spending to rise to US$3.7t in 2018”
By Edward Lim
The telecommunications market, except for mobile, is facing a slowdown in growth. According to IDC, the Pay TV services market, which consists of cable, satellite, Internet protocol (IP), and digital terrestrial TV services, will remain flat over from 2017 to 2021.
With the advent of robotaxis, car sales are expected to peak in 2022, according to Canalys.
When WhatsApp was down for a few hours last Friday (November 3), Facebook timelines were filled with panic posts by people unable to communicate on WhatsApp. Snapchat is reported to be down at the point of writing and again, there is frenzy over the outage. Continue reading “5 things to do when your social media platform is down”
The launch of the iPhone 8 and drop of prices of older models have helped Apple turn in a sterling quarter in China, with shipment rising 40 percent to 11 million units this Q3.
By Edward Lim
Perhaps it’s something like a forbidden fruit. The harder it it to get, the more we want it. Google tempted us with the Google Home smart speaker but it was not available in Singapore or anywhere in the region. It was only in July that the device was finally available in Australia.
Anyway, as with most gadget lovers, there’s always a way to get our hands on the desired device. In my case, I managed to snare one in Walmart in San Jose while attending a conference there in April. Actually, I bought two — one as a gift to a friend.
Greater internet and mobile device accessibility are driving e-commerce growth in Southeast Asia.
According to ABI Research, Smart Retail has gone through revolutionary changes in the past 10 years and will exponentially continue to do so going forward. Brick and mortar stores are no longer the only option for consumers across the globe to make their everyday purchases, due to significant advancements in technology, both in-store and online.
Key players include Senion, who implements some of the world’s largest Indoor Positioning System (IPS) solutions to enhance in-store experiences, and AisleLabs who provides shopper traffic behavior analytics to help retailers optimise store layouts. Leading POS software vendors, Shopkeep and Square are allowing retailers to sell across multi-channels from a single platform. These and other key vendors are paving paths to making the offline and online worlds seamless experiences.
Continue reading “E-commerce to account for a quarter of retail sales by 2025”
The role of the CIO is changing, according to a Gartner survey of 3,160 CIO respondents in 98 countries.
The findings revealed that the CIO role is transitioning from delivery executive to business executive, from controlling cost and engineering processes, to driving revenue and exploiting data.
Ninety-five percent of CIOs expect their jobs to change or be remixed due to digitalisation. While world-class IT delivery management is a given, it will take up less and less of the CIO’s time.
