Mobile Phones Blog

High-end audio manufacturers Bang & Olufsen, who teamed up with Samsung to make the celebrated Serenata handset (and the not-so-celebrated Serene) and contribute audio components to the U600 and F400 handsets have bowed out of the mobile sector.

The Danish audio kings have ended their relationship with the Korean electronics powerhouse, meaning that no more Samsung phones or DVD players will come equipped with B&O-branded components.

Bang & Olufsen big wig Karl Kristian Hvidt Nielsen said that the decision was purely a financial one, based on the dastardly credit crunch meaning that folks no longer had as much cash to throw around for their infamously expensive equipment as they did before.

The news comes as Motorola unveiled their über-pricey AURA fashion phone, a handset which boasts an attention to detail of which the boys at B&O would be proud of. But as the world tightens its collective purse string, perhaps launching a rather expensive item isn’t such as good idea right now, especially when you plan to give thousands of your own workers the boot…

To say that Motorola’s fortune of late has been somewhat chequered would be as big an understatement as saying that the iPhone has done kind of alright; however, the announcement of the new AURA luxury handset from Motorola looks set to change this. Dubbed “The Return of Artistry”, by the Big M, the AURA is a very finely crafted luxury handset, rocking a never-seen-before design, which, according to the press release “breaks convention and re-establishes artistry in mobile device design and manufacturing”.

The AURA certainly has something of an art deco feel about it, with its chemically etched contour lines and unique circular display screen – the first to ever be used on a mobile – which kicks out images in 16 million colours.

Consisting of more than 700 individual components, the AURA is forged from some seriously high-grade materials, which not only contribute to the overall aesthetic of the handset, but also confer a level of durability – just as well, as the AURA is a rotate-open handset, which swings around the circular screen, revealing the numeric keypad and standard mobile phone menu and command keys, all done over in shiny, anodized aluminium.

The swing mechanism features highly robust hardened steel gears which are protected with a tungsten carbide coating, apparently the same level of protection afforded to the gears of high-performance racing cars.

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Korean electronics firm LG Electronics Inc reported record profits this quarter as sales of mobile phones surged.

Second quarter earnings increased by 84% to 706.9 billion won (£347.8m), from 384.6 billion won a year earlier. The company sold a record 27.7 million mobile phones, achieving particular success with their high-end touch-screen phones Viewty, Venus and Secret models, which have been spurred by Apple’s immensely popular iPhone.

In addition, sales of LCD TV sets rose by 86% from last year, and sales of plasma sets increased by 31%. LG is currently the fourth largest mobile phone manufacturer in the world, after Nokia, Samsung and Motorola. Sales of LG handsets are set to overtake those of Motorola this quarter, according to estimates by Macquarie Group Ltd.

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Once considered one of the weaker players in the mobile phones market, LG turned its reputation around with the launch of its stylish Black Label series two years ago. Its third and latest offering in the series is the LG Secret, whose casing of carbon fibre, metal and faux-leather has whetted appetites with its swish-yet-solid feel. The arrival of the Secret has also been heralded with an odd Matrix-style TV ad (see below) which approaches car adverts in terms of pretension.

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We are entering a world where many devices, perhaps all of them, will come with only two controls, a power button and a touch screen, so expect a three year ramp in handsets to make this the favored interface.

Exactly one year ago Apple introduced the first generation of its iPhone and the iPod Touch, and in the intervening year this has given birth to an entirely new industry. It's one thing as a component supplier to have a device on your books that theoretically you can make which allow touch screen control, and another entirely to go around hiring factory space to go into volume production and start driving profits from a new product line.

Prior to the first iPhone the handset industry remained unconvinced that the timing to introduce touch screens was quite yet upon us. Now there is a mad panic to take up capacity. That's how these things work, one company risks the idea, it takes off, everybody follows…

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Can you say lawsuit? In a bid to take the wind out of Apple’s sales, Samsung have snuck this sneaky-looking iClone out just in time for the announcement of the brand spanking new 3G iPhone. Have a look for yourself:

Like the iPhone, the Samsung boasts a large 3 inch touchscreen display, fully integrated GPS tracking features, and comes in two versions, one of which comes with 8GB worth of storage, and the other which, you guessed it, comes with 16GB of memory. The Ominia also one-ups the new iPhone by allowing users to expand the onboard memory via the dependable microSD card slot.

Did we mention that the Omnia comes with quad band connectivity and 3G HSDPA for downloads at speeds of up to 7.2Mbps? No? Well, it does. Impressive yes? Especially when you consider that by the time this gets over here (Q3 by our estimates), Vodafone ought to have extended their high-speed networks to cover other areas of the UK besides London. Timing is everything;

Fresh from their collaboration with Armani, Samsung teamed up with renown Danish audio equipment manufacturers Bang & Olufsen to create a phone that, as you would expect, delivers optimum audio performance in a mobile phone handset. This should finally put an end to those Dom Joly-esque phone conversations where you’re forced to jam a finger in your other ear and shout loudly.

The two companies recently announced the existence of the Serenata - which resembles an inverted iPod that’s been given an art deco makeover - at a conference in Hong Kong. Attendant corporate fanfare read thus:

“Both Bang & Olufsen and Samsung share a passion for innovation and consumer-focused technology. I’m proud to say that our customers have seen true innovation of music players and mobile phones since we launched Serene two years ago. Serenata is another example of new ways to think about the mobile phone,” said Geesung Choi, president of the Telecommunications Network Business in Samsung Electronics.

“We have high expectations for Serenata, as it is a result of our joint vision to constantly push the boundaries and bring unique and exciting products to our customers,” chimed Lars Myrup, MD of Bang & Olufsen Asia.

Perhaps learning a lesson from the BeoSound 2 (B&O’s MP3 player which bombed) support for a greater range of file formats such as MP3, WMA and AAC in included; the main focus of the Serenata is that it will be able to readily support playback of “uncompressed” lossless music, making the Serenata the audiophile’s handset of choice. Sounds good to us! (Sorry)

LG have finally revealed the official name of the third in their ‘Black Label’ series of handsets - the LG KF750, available now, will be more commonly known as the LG Secret.

Boasting a design that’s as robust as it is eye catching, and an array of decent features, this slimline slider is sexy enough for fashion whores, and pimped out with enough tech to keep your average geek happy. As we reported before, the Secret is composed of high-grade durable materials which means that it will retain its box fresh feel long after purchase. The back of the phone is protected by a black carbon fibre canopy, and the main screen and the touch-sensitive ‘neon touch’ soft keys are protected by a scratch-resistant tempered glass plate.

Feature wise, the Secret packs a whole load of tricks into its 103 x 51 x 12 mm body. The 5 Megapixel camera comes with the ability to make ultra-sharp recordings at 120 frames per second, with all the same video editing effects (slo-mo etc) that are present on the Viewty; everything you record is also DivX-® certified, meaning that capturing funny moments with your mates and uploading them onto the interweb is an effortless process. Built-in gyroscopic sensors also means that the Secret knows which way its being held, and so will accordingly reorient its screen from portrait to landscape.

The fashion phone battle takes yet another turn as it emerges that renowned French fashion and perfume powerhouse Christian Dior have followed in the pedicured footsteps of fashion rivals Prada and Giorgio Armani by lending their designer talents to a mobile phone manufacturer.

Unlike Prada and Armani, who went overseas to work respectively with Korean giants LG and Samsung, Dior have opted to keep their business partnership a more domestic affair by hooking up with the French phone company ModeLabs Group SA - a fitting union seeing as ‘Mode’ is French for ‘fashion’.

The handset itself is of the clamshell variety, with its exterior styled to resemble a perfume bottle, and features a touchscreen display, camera, quad band, and a unique ‘micro phone’ device called My Dior - we’re not quite sure how it works, we think it’s meant to act as a remote control which clips to the exterior of a handbag (which, naturally, would also be by Dior) in order to act as a sort of life line, avoiding any frantic scrambling for incoming calls.

At $5000 a throw, the Dior look doesn’t come cheap, meaning that this catwalk queen has more in common with Nokia Vertu’s exorbitantly priced Ferrari Phone.

The Samsung Soul, featured on our site right now, has already been performing as well as was expected, and is all set to become one of the big sellers this summer. Samsung have just launched a new luxury Silver model of the Soul; this version comes encased in a sexy, highly reflective metallic jacket, and boasts all of the great features of the original (5 Megapixel camera, with autofocus and flash, MP3/WMA/AAC and eAAC+ support, and Bluetooth just for starters).

The powerful handset, which comes with 128MB of onboard memory (microSD expandable) HSDPA browsing, and an innovative touchscreen interface could only really be improved superficially.

The Silver Samsung Soul is currently only available through Mobiles.co.uk, and is available on all the main networks. Interested? Click here for more details.