Android

Google's Nexus One may have gotten off to a rocky start with consumers, but the "superphone" is making fast inroads with wireless carriers. Google this week started selling a Nexus One that will run on AT&T's 3G network, and has also inked a deal with Sprint Nextel. Google previously struck deals with T-Mobile, Vodafone and Verizon Wireless.

Sprint hasn't announced pricing or the availability date, but the carrier is already priming the competitive pump with marketing messages that proclaim its network has twice the coverage of AT&T and 10 times the coverage of T-Mobile.

Struggling technology company Motorola Inc. said Thursday it plans to split in two in early 2011 -- with one half containing its consumer-focused mobile phone and television set-top box products, and the other holding divisions that target business customers.

The split will give current shareholders a share in each new company, which will be roughly the same size in terms of annual revenue at $11 billion. Both halves will be publicly traded.

Verizon Wireless said Wednesday that it will launch another Android-based smartphone from Motorola next month. The Motorola Devour will be the first phone on Verizon's national network to feature MOTOBLUR -- an application and service suite that provides users with dynamically pushed Internet content via a unique user interface.

It may not be in the same category as proof that aliens are visiting Earth, but it's probably the next best thing. On Sunday, a company named Flurry Analytics said it has proof that about five dozen devices matching "the characteristics of Apple's rumored tablet device" are being tested on the company's Cupertino, Calif., campus.

In the mobile world, alliances are shifting as fast as a good season of the Survivor TV series. The latest shift, possibly seismic, is Apple versus Google, and a new report suggests that the growing competition between the purported allies includes the possibility of Microsoft's Bing search engine becoming the default choice on the iPhone.

Google's Nexus One smartphone, which grabbed the spotlight recently among the wave of new devices based on its open-source Android operating system, sold an estimated 20,000 units in its first week. That sales estimation by a company that tracks applications is being interpreted by some industry observers as disappointing.

The number came from Flurry, which estimates new smartphones by tracking more than 10,000 third-party applications in more than 25 million end-user sessions each day.

'Pretty Uninspiring Stuff'

LG Electronics said Wednesday that it has set a goal of selling 140 million cell phones in 2010. The South Korea-based handset maker also revealed that it plans to become one of the top two mobile-device manufacturers in the world by 2012.

To help boost unit sales, LG will focus on the lucrative smartphone market. Hopes are especially high for Android-based phones, which are expected to make up more than half of LG's upcoming smartphone releases, the company said.

Apple has plans to launch the iPhone 4G this spring, according to published reports. The next generation of the popular smartphone will have an organic light-emitting diode (OLED) screen, video chat, a removable battery, and an ARM-based Coretex-A9 processor and be released in the April-May time frame, an Apple representative has told The Korea Times. The iPhone 4G is also expected to have powerful graphics chips that will provide higher video resolution and better still images when taking pictures.

Speculation about Google's hardware plans is reaching a fever pitch, as the company has invited members of the media to an "Android press gathering" on Jan. 5 at the company's "Googleplex" headquarters.

With more than two weeks left in the Christmas-shopping season, Barnes & Noble's nook e-reader went on sale Monday. The petite electronic book reader from the giant bookselling retail chain is being watched carefully for its impact on the growing e-book industry -- and for its sales performance compared to its main competitor, Amazon's Kindle.