Sony is now a sales monster!

Guess who the number two cell phone manufacturer in India is? If you guessed Apple, or Samsung, or Nokia, or HTC, then you’d be wrong: it’s Sony.

Although Sony has been producing quality handsets and has been a presence in the mobile phone landscape, it hasn’t exactly been known to be dominant or at the top of the game. However, in India, Sony has seen tremendous growth, surpassing even Apple.

How were the able to do this? It’s all diversification and strategy. Sony focused on dishing out low-priced handsets that fall in the $166-$333 range, (10k to 20k rupees). That, combined with a $65 million advertising campaign has pushed the brand into cell phone market glory, making them second to only the mighty Samsung in the country.

Here are the sales figures: 9.1% of all smartphones sold in India are Sony models. Samsung takes a huge piece of the pie with a monstrous 43%, leaving Apple with 7% of sales. These are all records from Q4 2013 and measure the value of phones sold.

In terms of actual units, and not profits, Samsung was still on top with 38%, Micromax with 13% (they offer much cheaper devices so aren’t making as much of a profit as Sony), and then Sony came in third, followed by Apple in fourth place with 5.5% and 2% of smartphones sold respectively.

So what models were the winning handsets for Sony in India? The Xperia M Dual, and Xperia C. The Japanese manufacturer may be receiving stiff competition, however, with the re-released iPhone 4 (retailing for $375 in the region) and the upcoming, $100 Nokia X.

We have yet to see if Sony will continue to grow their market share in India, but for now, it looks like they have succeeded in establishing their brand as a popular and trusted one.

The Best of CES 2014!

CES ain’t quite what it used to be. Pretty much all the big guys have pulled out in favor of doing their own events. The phones are OK and the 4K TVs pretty, but a dime a dozen. But there are still some hidden treasures that are amazing. Here’s all the stuff from CES that made us squeal with glee.

The Oculus Rift Crystal Cove Prototype

So the Oculus Rift is fantastic. If you’ve used it in its original incarnation, you know that it’s incredible. It’s virtual reality…

The Oculus Rift may not be ready for consumers yet, but with each beta revision it’s becoming more and more incredible. This year’s beta model—complete with positional head tracking like never before—is more mind-blowing than ever. By far the most exciting thing at CES, even without being finished.

Nikon’s xxArray Person-Scanner

Alexx Henry teamed up with Nikon to create this xxArray camera system that uses over 64 cameras to create a perfectly detailed 3D model of a person. Naturally, Nikon inserted that 3D model into a video game. And being that person/model was a dream come true.

The WWE’s New Network

Yes, the WWE is getting its own network, and yes it was one of the best things at CES. Whether you’re into wrestling or not, the WWE’s new all-you-can-stream buffet-style offering is a shot at what the future of television could and should be for every channel and interest. So shirtless men throwing each other around while wearing spandex or not, this is fantastic.

Audi Quattro Concept Car

A car with laser-cannon headlights? Sure, why not. Audi’s crazy-awesome Quattro is just a concept, and probably not destined for roads any time soon if ever, but that doesn’t mean it’s any less of a tech marvel. And while the Quattro itself pre-dates CES, we didn’t find out the true glory of those laser headlights until last week, and frankly they could make this list on their own.

FLIR Thermal Camera iPhone Case

Want Predator-vision? You got it. FLIR’s thermal camera for the iPhone is exactly that. Thermal imaging is far from new, but this implementation is cheap(ish), convenient, and super want-able. You can’t tell me that you don’t want that on your phone right now, even if you might not want to pony up the (comparatively cheap) $350 for it. If that doesn’t make a killer CES gadget I don’t know what does.

Morphie’s Storage-Supplementing Battery Pack

There’s no MicroSD expansion slot on an iPhone, and they’re harder and harder to come by on Androids too. But Morphie’s solution—a battery pack that also adds storage—is a perfect solution for digital hoarders everywhere who suddenly decided they need more storage after buying the device. It’s not the flashiest gadget ever, but it solves a persistent problem pretty elegantly. And that’s super dope in its own subtle way.

Razer’s Modular Desktop PC

People have been building their own desktop computers for ages, but Razer’s Project Christine makes takes the tried and true hobby to an awesome height of ease. Snapping in parts like Legos seems like a joy, and each module is liquid cooled by default for extra coolness. And even though this is probably vaporware—Razer is just testing the waters and looking for reactions—it’s damned cool.

Sony’s Close-Up 4K Projector

Curved or flat, flexible or not, 4K TVs are beautiful. But they’re also expensive, huge, and just TVs. High res is fun but *yawn*.Sony’s Life Space UX Ultra Short-Throw 4K Projector, on the other hand, is a more novel take on the 4K craze, and mercifully easy to move. Of course it will cost a small fortune, and who knows if it will ever really make it to market, but damned if we all don’t want one right now.

Source: Gizmodo

CES 2014: Sony announces miniature flagship Xperia Z1 Compact

Sony has just announced the Xperia Z1 Compact at CES 2014. Unlike most mini flagship variants, it features a specs sheet that doesn’t compromise, and has almost identical specs to the Xperia Z1 flagship.

A closer look at the specs sheet, and you’ll see Sony have managed to fit in the same CPU, camera, memory, and internal storage into a size that’s truly compact:

• Dimensions: 127 x 64.9 x 9.5 mm, 137g
• Display: 4.3″ Triluminous IPS display of 720p resolution, 341ppi
• Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 800; quad-core Krait 400 at 2.2GHz, Adreno 330 GPU, 2GB RAM
• OS: Android 4.3 Jelly Bean (planned upgrade to 4.4 KitKat shortly after launch)
• Camera: 20.7 MP, Carl Zeiss optics, optical image stabilization, autofocus, LED flash, 2MP front-facing
• Video camera: 1080p @ 30fps video capture with both cameras
• Storage: 16GB built-in, microSD card slot with support of up to 64GB
• Connectivity: NFC, A-GPS+GLONASS, WLAN (2.4/5Ghz) a/b/g/n/ac, microUSB 2.0 (MHL), BlueTooth 4.0 LE
• Battery: 2,300 mAh
• Misc: FM Radio, built-in accelerometer, multi-touch input, proximity sensor
• Colors: Black, White, Pink, Lime, Yellow

The only thing that didn’t make the cut is the display resolution, which has been cut down to 720p, and the battery, which has been reduced to 2300 mAh – the same as on the previous Xperia Z flagship. Luckily those seem to balance out just fine and the Xperia Z1 compact promises pretty good battery life.

The Sony Xperia Z1 Compact is expected to hit markets next month. Its pricing wasn’t specified, but Sony confirmed it will slide between the Sony Xperia Z1 flagship and its Xperia Z predecessor.

Source: GSMArena

New Sony Xperia smartphone releases help company profits

The smartphone market up until recently was largely dominated by Apple and Samsung that are arguably the two major players, but there has been some movement on the Android platform with the likes of Sony and HTC getting their acts together by providing much more desirable hardware. Now it has been revealed that new Sony Xperia smartphone releases are helping company profits.

PlayStation maker Sony has just released its financial results for the second quarter of 2013 and the company revealed it has shifted 9.6 million Xperia handsets, which is an increase of 30% compared to the same period last year.

This equates to the best ever single quarter success for the company in terms of smartphone sales and has obviously been helped by the release of the Sony Xperia Z, and the Sony’s net profit came out at $35 million compared to a loss last year.

Its mobile division saw its sales rise by 36% to 3.9 billon that was led by sales of Xperia handsets as well as higher than average selling prices. This comes after the company has seen sales slide for its PlayStation 3 and previous losses in the TV market.

The company has also been helped by the weakening of the Yen making products coming out of Japan cheaper to foreign purchasers, but the company promised last year that it would launch new smartphones that would rival the competition.

This seems to be working so far and we can look forward to the next instalment in the Sony mobile revival with the release of the Xperia Honami later this year.

Sony Xperia Z handsets reportedly suffering sudden death!

A number of Sony Xperia Z users have reported their devices suffering from sudden death. Apparently, Sony’s flagship has been shutting down for no apparent reason with subsequent efforts to bring it back to life proving unsuccessful, save for a hard reset in a few cases.

There is no particular reason for the occurrence. Some users have blamed low battery for the issue, but others have had their Xperia Z expire with plenty of charge left in its battery.

Sony has acknowledged the issue and promised that a fix is in the works. It will be delivered to the users via an upcoming software update.