News

Apple supplier Broadcom getting out of Wi-Fi chip business

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 18, 2016

Fabless semiconductor company Broadcom is looking to phase-out its Wi-Fi chip-making business, according to industry sources who spoke with Taiwanese trade publication DigiTimes. Broadcom is currently Apple's top supplier of Wi-Fi chips used in Macs, iPhones, iPads and iPods so it looks like the Cupertino firm might be forced to find a new supplier soon.

Broadcom designs its own products but contracts out actual silicon production to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (TSMC), which also builds Apple-designed application processors for iOS devices.

Ford finally rolling out CarPlay starting with 2017 Escape model in May

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 18, 2016

Car maker Ford said on Friday that a new Escape model is going to officially become its first vehicle with CarPlay and Android Auto integration. Ford's 2017 Escape puts emphasis on maintaining the quality that made the vehicle an award-winner and the second best-selling Ford product in the United States last year.

In addition to CarPlay and Android Auto, the new Escape also includes a capable driver-assist technology and all-new Sync Connect that supports features like remote start and door locking through the new FordPass platform.

Scanner Pro 7 is here: OCR, workflows, distortion correction, revamped interface & more

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 17, 2016

Ukrainian developer Readdle today released Scanner Pro 7.0 for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, a major new version of its award-winning document, QR code and receipt scanner that has a revamped user interface and packs in a plethora of new features.

Among other enhancements, the new version packs in advanced optical character recognition (OCR) technology which automatically extracts text from sentences, paragraphs or whole scans, making Scanner Pro 7 more competitive with Scanbot.

Sega’s Sonic the Hedgehog speeds on to Apple TV

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 17, 2016

Japanese gaming giant Sega is making its long-expected move to bring some of its most popular mobile games to the living room. Fans can now play some of their favorite Sonic titles on the fourth-generation Apple TV for the very first time.

Starting today, Sonic 1 is compatible with the new Apple TV. Next Thursday, March 24, fans will be permitted to grab Sonic 2 for Apple TV from the tvOS App Store. In addition, Sonic CD for Apple TV will release on Thursday, March 31.

Miitomo, Nintendo’s first smartphone game, soft-launches in the App Store

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 16, 2018

As promised, Miitomo, Nintendo's very first smartphone game, on Thursday released on the Japanese App Store ahead of its worldwide debut.

The freemium title, billed as “a friendly conversation starter,” is based on the Mii universe and invites gamers to customize their Mii avatars by mixing and matching from a bunch of costumes and styles to make it their own.

Your Mii characters created in the iOS app can then be easily shared with friends on social media. And by asking and answering questions, you can find out unknown aspects about your friends along with things that you share in common. “Your friends' Mii characters will also visit you when you play,” said Nintendo.

T-Mobile adds nine new Binge On providers, including YouTube

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 17, 2016

T-Mobile's outspoken CEO, John Legere, announced on Thursday via a press release that Binge On, the carrier's feature that zeroes out video streaming, has added support for nine new providers, including Google-owned YouTube.

These providers are now part of Binge On initiative: Baeble Music, Discovery GO, ESNE TV, FilmOn.TV, Fox Business, Google Play Movies, KlowdTV, Red Bull TV and YouTube.

Unboxing video shows off claimed iPhone SE/7 cases

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 17, 2016

Popular YouTube channel Unbox Therapy on Thursday posted a hands-on video with an alleged case for Apple's upcoming iPhone 7.

While we have already seen a fair share of purported cases for the forthcoming smartphone refresh, the quality of this particular video gives us a much closer look at some of the design changes the iPhone 7 is said to bring to the table.

Like prior leaks, this particular case appears to confirm the general layout of the buttons on the iPhone 7, with the exception of one thing that stands out in particular.

Leaked packaging confirms ‘iPhone SE’ name, 16GB baseline model and NFC for Apple Pay

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 17, 2016

Thursday, a photo of what appears to be Chinese packaging for Apple's upcoming four-inch iPhone refresh was posted on Chinese social network Weibo.

The image allegedly shows the specifications sticker affixed to the box for the upcoming device while specifically mentioning 'iPhone SE' branding.

The '16GB' label on the sticker suggests that the iPhone SE will start out at sixteen gigabytes of storage, just like current iPhone models do. Additionally, the technical specifications section mentions Apple Pay compatibility, meaning the iPhone SE will include NFC, like previously suspected.

Apple Events app launches on tvOS App Store ahead of Monday’s ‘Let us loop you in’ media event

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 17, 2016

Apple has scheduled its 'Let us loop you in' media event on Monday, March 21. Ahead of the invite-only press conference, the company has released a native application, aptly named Apple Events, for the fourth-generation Apple TV in the tvOS App Store.

The app makes it easier for Apple fans to stream the company's media events live and watch replays of previous broadcasts on their box.

Apple shifting some of its iCloud services to Google’s Cloud Platform

Cody Lee ∙ Updated May 17, 2018

Apple has signed a deal with Google to use the search giant's Cloud Platform for some of its iCloud services, reports CRN. The site says that the two firms inked the deal late last year, and it's believed to be worth somewhere between $400-$600 million.

This is a major coup for Google’s enterprise cloud business, and its newly appointed chief Diane Greene. Although Apple has not publicly discussed its cloud backends, it's been reported that the iPhone maker spends $1 billion per year on Amazon's AWS.

As Apple News Format opens to all publishers, Apple launches ad campaign for News app

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 16, 2016

The native Apple News Format is now open to all independent publishers of all sizes as Apple has kicked off a brand new advertising campaign meant to persuade more people to use iOS 9's News app, Vanity Fair reported yesterday. Currently, the News app, which is basically an aggregator, has about forty million readers.

Last September's iOS 9 release brought out the News app with support from more than a hundred major publishers as launch partners.

Now everyone, bloggers included, can take advantage of the rich-media Apple News Format to deliver their content to iOS users in immersive ways, with interactive graphics, video, auto-resizing layouts, crisp typography and smooth animations.

Apple to accept native ads on News platform that display inline with regular articles

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 15, 2016

Apple yesterday shared new information regarding upcoming ad formats on News, its iOS 9 app and content-aggregating platform.

A developer document, titled “Ad Specifications for iAd” (PDF download), highlights several new ad formats that content creators and publishers can deploy in the News format, including so-called native ads which are basically sponsored posts that resemble normal articles and appear directly in users' feeds inline with regular articles.