Mobility Phones - Mobile Phones

The Board of Directors of Yahoo! Inc., a leading global Internet company, today sent the following letter to Steve Ballmer, Chief Executive Officer of Microsoft Corporation.Dear Steve:

Our Board has reviewed your most recent letter with regard to the unsolicited proposal you made to acquire Yahoo! on January 31, 2008.

Our Board carefully considered your unsolicited proposal, unanimously concluded that it was not in the best interests of Yahoo! and our stockholders, and rejected it publicly on February 11, 2008. Our Board cited Yahoo!’s global brand, large worldwide audience, significant recent investments in advertising platforms and future growth prospects, free cash flow and earnings potential, as well as its substantial unconsolidated investments, as factors in its decision.

At the same time, we have continued to make clear that we are not opposed to a transaction with Microsoft if it is in the best interests of our stockholders. Our position is simply that any transaction must be at a value that fully reflects the value of Yahoo!, including any strategic benefits to Microsoft, and on terms that provide certainty to our stockholders.

Since disclosing our Board’s position with respect to your proposal, we have presented our three-year financial and strategic plan to our stockholders, which supports our Board’s determination that your unsolicited proposal substantially undervalues Yahoo!. Those meetings with our stockholders have also provided us an opportunity to hear their views.

We have continued to launch new products and to take actions which leverage our scale, technology, people and platforms as we execute on the strategy we publicly articulated. Today, in fact, we are announcing AMP! from Yahoo!, a new advertising management platform designed to dramatically simplify the process of buying and selling ads online.

Finally, our Board has been actively and expeditiously exploring our strategic alternatives to maximize stockholder value, a process which is ongoing. All of these actions have been driven by our overarching commitment to maximize stockholder value.

Our Board’s view of your proposal has not changed. We continue to believe that your proposal is not in the best interests of Yahoo! and our stockholders. Contrary to statements in your letter, stockholders representing a significant portion of our outstanding shares have indicated to us that your proposal substantially undervalues Yahoo!. Furthermore, as a result of the decrease in your own stock price, the value of your proposal today is significantly lower than it was when you made your initial proposal.

In contrast to your assertions about the effect of general economic conditions on our business, Yahoo!’s business forecasts are consistent with what we outlined in our last earnings call. As you know, we recently reaffirmed our Q1 and full year guidance, which is a testament to our ability to perform in line with our expectations despite the current economic environment. In addition, our three-year financial and strategic plan which we have made public demonstrates significant potential upside not previously communicated to the financial markets. This plan has received positive feedback from our stockholders, further strengthening the view that Yahoo! is worth well more as a standalone company than the value offered in your proposal, and would be even more valuable to Microsoft. Your own statements have made clear the strategic importance of Yahoo!’s substantial assets and capabilities to Microsoft.

We regret to say that your letter mischaracterizes the nature of our discussions with you. We have had constructive conversations together regarding a variety of topics, including integration and regulatory issues. Your comment that we have refused to enter into negotiations to conclude an agreement are particularly curious given we have already rejected your initial proposal, nominally $31 per share at the time, for substantially undervaluing Yahoo! and your suggestions in your letter and the media that you are considering lowering the value of your proposal. Moreover, Steve, you personally attended two of these meetings and could have advanced discussions in any way you saw fit.

As to antitrust, we have discussed with you our concerns. Any transaction between us would result in a thorough regulatory review in multiple jurisdictions. As a follow up to a recent meeting among our respective legal advisors we had on this topic, and at your request, we provided to you on March 28 a list of additional information we would need to further our understanding of the regulatory issues associated with any transaction. To date, you have still not provided any of the requested information.

We consider your threat to commence an unsolicited offer and proxy contest to displace our independent Board members to be counterproductive and inconsistent with your stated objective of a friendly transaction. We are confident that our stockholders understand that our independent Board is best positioned to objectively and knowledgeably evaluate our Company’s alternatives and to maximize value.

In conclusion, please allow us to restate our position, so there can be no confusion. We are open to all alternatives that maximize stockholder value. To be clear, this includes a transaction with Microsoft if it represents a price that fully recognizes the value of Yahoo! on a standalone basis and to Microsoft, is superior to our other alternatives, and provides certainty of value and certainty of closing. Lastly, we are steadfast in our commitment to choosing a path that maximizes stockholder value and we will not allow you or anyone else to acquire the company for anything less than its full value.

Very truly yours,

Roy Bostock Chairman of the Board

Jerry Yang Chief Executive Officer

AT&T Inc. and Microsoft Corp. today announced a collaborative alliance that will transform the way consumers shop for mobile devices. AT&T will become the first company in the world to bring Microsoft Surface(TM) to life in a retail environment, giving customers the ability to explore their mobile worlds using touch and device-recognition technology.Microsoft Surface is the first commercially available surface computer from Microsoft. Beginning April 17, customers can experience Microsoft Surface in select AT&T retail locations, including stores in New York City, Atlanta, San Antonio and San Francisco. Based on the success and learning from these initial pilot deployments, plans for further expansion across AT&T’s 2,200 U.S.-based retail stores will be determined.

Microsoft Surface is a 30-inch table-like display that gives individuals or multiple people the opportunity to interact with devices and content in a way that feels familiar — by using touch, gestures and placement of devices on the display. In essence, it’s a surface come to life for exploring, learning, sharing, creating, buying and much more.

AT&T plans to harness the power of Surface to provide its retail store visitors with unique opportunities to learn about the growing universe of mobile applications and devices. The interactive touch displays, which will work without a traditional mouse or keyboard, will allow customers to:

– Learn. Customers can review features of a particular mobile device by simply placing it on the display. Surface will recognize the device and provide a graphical overview of its capabilities. Customers can place two devices side by side on the unit and easily compare their features.

– Explore. Customers can view interactive coverage maps at the national, state, local or street level, using simple touch and hand movement to scale and move the maps, determining a customer’s coverage area.

– Customize. In the future, customers will be able to drag and drop ringtones, graphics, video and more by “grabbing” content with their hands from a menu on the display and “dropping” it into the phone.

In addition to these exciting features, AT&T and Microsoft will continue to collaborate on new and innovative ways to expand Surface capabilities in AT&T stores.

“We are thrilled to bring this groundbreaking new technology to our stores so that we can introduce customers to their mobile worlds in a very personal and easy way,” said Ralph de la Vega, president and CEO, AT&T Mobility. “We look forward to working with Microsoft to continue developing new ways for our customers to learn about the ever-growing lineup of mobile devices and applications.”

“Microsoft Surface transforms the retail environment from a transaction destination to a customer engagement destination,” said Robbie Bach, president, Entertainment & Devices Division, Microsoft. “With innovative and intuitive ways of accessing information and digital content on Microsoft Surface, consumers now have an entirely new, unique and personalized shopping experience. We’re excited to have AT&T bring this to life and be the first company showcasing Surface in its retail locations.”

AT&T plans to unveil the new displays in stores in New York City, Atlanta, San Antonio and San Francisco on April 17, followed by additional stores in other markets based on the success of the first phase of deployment.

Relevantis, Inc. today released the first advertising solution to support Android, Google’s new mobile phone platform. Beating Google to the punch, Relevantis’ Universal Ad Platform supports Android-optimized web sites but is aimed squarely at developers of Android widgets, applications and games. The platform allows these products to include relevant advertising, giving developers an ad-supported distribution option. Relevantis takes a small portion of advertising revenues as its fee, and only makes money when the developer makes money.Relevantis specializes in supporting highly relevant advertising within embedded applications and widgets. Its new platform enables Android developers to include personalized and location-aware advertising within their applications. And, unlike the expected Google ad platform for Android, Relevantis supports a variety of ad networks — not just Google.

“When Google announced Android, everybody expected that it would exclusively support Google ads. However, Google’s ad platform doesn’t even support Android applications at all yet; and, when it does, the ads will most likely be available for Android-optimized web sites instead of embedded applications,” said Relevantis CEO Scott Searle, adding that “Relevantis’ solution is uniquely designed to support Android widgets, games and other embedded applications as well as web sites. And, perhaps more importantly, our platform supports multiple ad networks, not just Google. So, developers can choose to receive ads from one or more major networks like Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL in addition to Google.”

Relevantis provides Android developers with access to a powerful set of application programming interfaces (APIs) that allow for full control over the advertising presented in their products. The APIs also enable the caching of ads on Android devices. This allows applications to display advertising even when the device is out of range of a network or when it is in airplane mode. For example, an Android user riding the subway in New York City can view and interact with ads without being connected to the Internet.

“The goal is totally integrated ads that compliment the Android experience,” said Mr. Searle.

Sprint announced that it is offering the industry’s first EV-DO Rev. A-capable handset as part of a software upgrade available for the Mogul by HTC. Introduced in June 2007, the Mogul is a Windows Mobile device operating on the Sprint Mobile Broadband Network and is packed with advanced wireless capabilities to keep users productive and connected for personal and professional reasons — all at SprintSpeed. The new software ROM and downloading instructions are available at www.america.htc.com/mogulupdate.EV-DO Rev. A technology supports faster data rates and higher system capacity enabling users to send and receive large amounts of data at broadband speeds (speeds comparable to basic DSL). Wherever EV-DO Rev. A coverage is available, average download speeds will increase from 400-700 Kbps to 600 Kbps-1.4 Mbps and average upload speeds will increase from 50-70 Kbps to 350-500 Kbps. These increased data speeds provide customers the instant gratification of quickly downloading large e-mail files on their phone while in a taxi cab, finishing and sending the sales report before their plane takes off and wirelessly downloading music to listen to directly from a Sprint handset. Because Sprint embraces an open approach to mobile Web access, customers may access the Web sites of their choice and download third party applications to enjoy anytime, anywhere. The Sprint Mobile Broadband Network (inclusive of data roaming) reaches more than 234 million people, 13,453 cities and 1,321 airports, with the vast majority upgraded to the faster EV-DO Rev. A technology.

Besides enabling increased data speeds for e-mail, Web, document management and other tasks, the free software download also provides advanced GPS functionality allowing support of popular applications such as Sprint Navigation. Sprint Navigation provides audio and visual turn-by-turn directions, more than 10 million local listings, and one-click traffic rerouting on compatible phones, similar to an in-vehicle GPS system.

“The Mogul by HTC now delivers the full power of the Sprint Mobile Broadband Network from the convenience of a handset, giving our customers a speed and capacity advantage unavailable anywhere else in the marketplace,” said Danny Bowman, vice president of customer equipment for Sprint. “Besides accessing core capabilities like calendar management, contact lists, personal and corporate email, and viewing documents, customers can use the benefits of SprintSpeed to stay connected, informed and entertained at anytime.”

The enhanced capabilities of the Mogul combined with Sprint’s recently launched $99.99 Simply Everything pricing plan delivers undeniable value to Sprint customers. The $99.99 Simply Everything plan offers customers unlimited voice and data and is available for any Sprint or Nextel Direct Connect handset. Pricing complexity and concerns about overage charges are virtually eliminated letting customers think more about how they can use their wireless device for work and play and less about their bill. For families, Simply Everything includes an incremental $5 discount for each incremental line, up to five lines on the same bill. For example, two lines would amount to $194.98 ($99.99 + $94.99); a third line would cost an additional $89.99. This is in sharp contrast to the multi-line savings offered by some other carriers. Existing Sprint customers can switch to the “Simply Everything” plan without extending their current contract. New line activations require a two-year agreement.

The Mogul continues to be a premium Windows Mobile device in the Sprint device portfolio replicating the familiar Windows PC-based experience and utilizing the Microsoft Windows Mobile 6 Professional Edition to deliver key benefits including increased security and added support for HTML email and Microsoft Office Mobile. Other key features include:

* Innovative design with slide-out QWERTY keyboard, large touch screen, a thumbwheel and five-way navigation button.

* Support for Sprint applications including Sprint Music Store and OnDemand.

* ActiveSync software allowing fast and accurate synching of Outlook Mobile applications included on the device such as e-mail, calendar, task lists and contacts.

* Phone as Modem capabilities to use the phone as a wireless modem with a laptop.

* A 2-megapixel camera with flash, auto-focus and camcorder capabilities.

* Stereo Bluetooth wireless technology.

The Mogul by HTC is available in Sprint Stores, online at www.sprint.com and in Sprint business sales channels for $199.99 with a two-year service agreement and a $100 mail-in-rebate.

Nokia today announced plans to make Microsoft Silverlight available for S60 on Symbian OS, the world’s leading smartphone software(1), as well as for Series 40 devices and Nokia Internet tablets. Adding support for Silverlight will extend opportunities for developers to create rich, interactive applications that run on multiple platforms in a consistent and reliable way.”Today’s consumers are very clear in what they want: easy access to tightly integrated services and data on any device,” said Lee Williams, Senior Vice President in Nokia’s Devices software organization. “Nokia’s software strategy is based on cross-platform development environments, enabling the creation of rich applications across the Nokia device range. Nokia aims to support market leading and content rich internet application environments and to embrace and encourage open innovation. By working with Microsoft, we are creating terrific opportunities and additional choices for the development community, S60 licensees and the industry as a whole.”

Silverlight is a cross-browser, cross-platform plug-in for delivering next-generation media experiences and rich interactive applications. Silverlight is already powering thousands of applications around the world and organizations including Entertainment Tonight, the NBA and NBC Universal to deliver superior Web-based experiences to their customers. The arrangement with Nokia will substantially extend the reach of Silverlight by making the platform available for hundreds of millions of devices, including S60 on Symbian smartphones from a range of manufacturers, as well as Nokia Series 40 devices and Nokia Internet tablets.

“This is an important relationship on so many levels. Working with Nokia means we are easily able to reach a huge number of mobile users, including customers of all S60 licensees. This is a significant step in gaining broad acceptance for Silverlight and ensuring it is platform agnostic. This is critical since we want to make sure developers and designers don’t have to constantly recreate the wheel and build different versions of applications and services for multiple operating systems, browsers and platforms,” said S. Somasegar, Senior Vice President of Microsoft’s Developer Division.

“There is clear market demand for rich, Web-based services across a variety of device types, but developing these can often be commercially difficult. For Microsoft this extends Silverlight to a broader range of vendors, platforms and devices. For Nokia it expands the web runtime options on its devices, enabling a wider community of developers and more applications. This should help the uptake of higher speed mobile services and advance a new era of anytime, anywhere device-based computing”, said Bola Rotibi , Principal Analyst at Ovum.

Microsoft will demonstrate Silverlight on S60 during the opening keynote at Microsoft’s MIX08 conference on March 5 in Las Vegas. Silverlight is intended to be available to S60 developers later this year with initial service delivery anticipated shortly thereafter for all S60 licensees. This will allow S60 application developers to use an even wider range of development environments for S60 on Symbian OS than today. Today S60 developers can use: C++ (using native Symbian OS APIs and Open C providing subset of standard POSIX libraries), S60 Web Run-time (supporting standards-based web technologies such as Ajax, JavaScript, CSS and HTML), the Java(TM) language, Flash Lite from Adobe, and Python.

Microsoft Silverlight availability for Nokia Series 40 devices and Nokia Internet tablets will be confirmed later.

Sprint and Samsung Mobile announce availability of the M520 by Samsung. This unique slider phone makes it easy for customers to access the Web, find local restaurants, watch live television, download their favorite songs, send text messages or use GPS to find their way home.As the first Power Vision(TM) phone in a slim, slider form factor, the M520 by Samsung is simple to operate and slips easily into a pocket or purse. It offers a robust multi-tasking capability that gives customers the ability to play music in background mode while also using the phone for text messaging, playing games or surfing the Internet.

Operating on the Sprint Mobile Broadband network, the M520 by Samsung provides access to Sprint exclusive services and multimedia content, including:

* Sprint Navigation, powered by Telenav, with GPS-enabled audio and visual turn-by-turn driving directions, one-click traffic rerouting and more than 10 million local listings.

* Live Search for Sprint, by Microsoft, gives voice-enabled access to directory information on-the-go, GPS-enabled directions, interactive maps and one-touch click to call access.

* Sprint Music Store(SM) allowing users to browse and wirelessly download full-length songs directly to their phone from a selection of more than 1.8 million songs for just 99 cents each;

* Sprint TV(SM) with more than 50 channels of live and on-demand video and audio;

* Sprint Exclusive Entertainment (SEE), the industry’s only made-for-mobile sports and entertainment video programming network.

(Standard data charges apply to all downloads.)

“We are pleased to introduce this simple-to-use and inexpensive slider phone into our robust Power Vision portfolio,” said Danny Bowman, Sprint’s vice president of Customer Equipment. “Accessing services that are useful and entertaining is truly effortless with the M520 by Samsung. Customers will appreciate the uncomplicated menus and smooth multi-tasking capabilities.”

This device is packed with helpful essentials including Web access, SMS voice and text messaging, Phone as Modem, picture caller ID, Wireless Backup and a MicroSD slot supporting up to 4GB of memory (64MB card enclosed.) Additional features of the M520 by Samsung include stereo Bluetooth(R) with audio caller ID that enables the user to identify callers with a spoken voice while they listen to music and a 1.3 megapixel camera with 2x digital zoom and camcorder functionality.

This device is now available in all Sprint retail channels including www.sprint.com and 1-800-SPRINT1. Pricing for the M520 by Samsung is just $49.99 with a $50 mail-in rebate and 2-year contract ($249.99 SRP.) It measures 4.01″ x 2.04″ x 0.5″ when closed and weighs less than 2.8 ounces.

Vodafone UK today announced that it has completed a deal with Neverfail, a leading global software company providing affordable continuous availability and disaster recovery solutions. Vodafone will now offer business customers a high availability and disaster recovery service for mobile email using the Neverfail software.In today’s business environment access to email whilst on the move is a key requirement for many organizations. Losing email access, even for a short time, can have drastic consequences for businesses. The Vodafone Neverfail High Availability Service for BlackBerry will provide uninterrupted availability of BlackBerry services to Vodafone business customers.

The Vodafone Neverfail High Availability Service for BlackBerry monitors the health of the entire email environment, including the server hardware, the network infrastructure, the application and the operating system. If any anomalies are identified, Neverfail will immediately take action to prevent loss of service. It will either automatically attempt to restart applications before they fail, switch over to a secondary server, or alert the IT staff so that no downtime or loss of service is experienced. Once the issue is resolved, they are automatically switched back to the main servers and neither users nor administrators are required to restart their applications.

“As market leader in the UK in providing BlackBerry services, it was important to be able to offer robust access to email. By adding Neverfail’s solution into our Managed Service portfolio, we can offer enormous service expertise to protect critical parts of our customers’ IT infrastructure,” said Curt Hopkins, Head of Enterprise Mobility Solutions, Vodafone UK. “Neverfail has an enviable reputation for protecting mission-critical systems with its continuous availability solutions and we have selected them as our preferred provider for high availability and disaster recovery for BlackBerry and email implementations.”

“Vodafone as a company relies on continuous mobile access to email and we have also selected the Neverfail solution to use within our own organization,” continued Hopkins. “Having complete confidence that email will be available 24/7 365 days a year is a significant advantage as many key staff depend on access via Blackberry devices in order to fulfil their roles.”

“Vodafone is well ahead of the general telecommunications market. Rather than just providing handsets and airtime minutes, Vodafone is offering strategic services, such as high availability, to support the entire BlackBerry platform,” said Richard Ruddlesden, EMEA Channel Director, Neverfail. “We are very pleased that Vodafone has selected us to offer its customers an exceptional communications experience that is the best in the industry.”

Vodafone Managed Services will work in partnership with Neverfail in the UK to offer customers advanced capabilities such as continuous availability for mobile devices and communications solutions from RIM, Microsoft and IBM Lotus Notes.

Yahoo! is driving the industry towards the future of mobile communications with Yahoo! oneConnect(TM). In 2007, Yahoo! revolutionized mobile search with Yahoo! oneSearch(TM), an optimized search experience designed for the mobile device. Today the company will unveil a plan for similarly reinventing mobile communications by demonstrating its upcoming Yahoo! oneConnect service. Yahoo! oneConnect is expected to become available in the award-winning Yahoo! Go 3.0 and Yahoo!’s new mobile home page in Q2 2008.”Last year we set out to reinvent mobile search with Yahoo! oneSearch, and today with 29 operator partnerships around the world covering more than 600 million subscribers, we believe we have certainly succeeded,” said Marco Boerries, executive vice president, Connected Life, Yahoo!. “Now, we intend to reinvent mobile communications through Yahoo! oneConnect, a revolutionary new mobile communications service that will combine integrated mobile messaging with a socially-connected address book.”

Yahoo! oneConnect will be the first mobile product with an open architecture that aggregates communications tools - email, instant messaging (IM), text messaging (SMS), and social networks - for a new level of convenience in mobile communications.

Yahoo! oneConnect is designed to include the following features, which will:

– Socially-connected address book - Provide users the capability to integrate activity from popular social networks, professional networks, and communities into their address book, keeping it always in sync. Consumers will be able to view status updates, photo uploads, and the recent activity (”pulse”) of contacts across all their networks.

– Integrated mobile messaging - Offer seamless integration of IM and SMS, including threaded conversations. Any messaging service will be able to use Yahoo! oneConnect’s open APIs to plug into the application’s messaging feature - enabling consumers to access a wide range of popular services, such as Yahoo! Messenger, Google(R) Talk, AOL(R) Instant Messenger and MSN(TM) Messenger.

– Status - Give consumers the capability to view their contacts by their most recent status updates on popular social networks, as well as update their own status on their favorite social networks - in one easy step - and automatically broadcast it to their friends.

– Pulse - Provide consumers the functionality to see a dynamic overview of what friends are up to, including recent photos, their status, profile updates, and recommendations based on their most recent actions on popular social networks.

– Favorites - Keep the people consumers interact with most at their fingertips. Users will be able to set up messaging shortcuts to make reaching out as quick as possible.

– Social contact card - Allow users to aggregate the most relevant information on any given contact, including archives of past communications, detailed pulse history, and one-click ways to initiate communication.

– Innovative location-sensing technology - Provide new ways to locate, chat with, and exchange contact information with nearby Yahoo! oneConnect users. Proximity alerts will notify consumers when a contact enters their vicinity.

– An open communications platform - Give users the functionality to communicate via multiple communications tools - such as IM, SMS, and social networks. Widgets will provide users the capability to access their email across major email providers, such as Yahoo! Mail, MSN Hotmail(R), Gmail(R), and AOL(R) Mail. Additionally, Yahoo! is in discussions with DataViz(R), a company that allows mobile users to access their corporate Microsoft Exchange(TM) email accounts and Microsoft Office(TM), documents, to work together on widget versions of its industry-acclaimed RoadSynch(R) and Documents To Go(R) applications.

After its release, Yahoo! oneConnect is expected to become available across hundreds of devices and mobile browsers around the world.

Visit the Yahoo! booth at Mobile World Congress to see Yahoo! oneConnect - 7B26, Hall 7. For more information on Yahoo! oneConnect, go to http://mobile.yahoo.com/oneconnect. Screenshots of Yahoo! oneConnect as well as Yahoo!’s complete Mobile World Congress 2008 press kit can be found at http://mobile.yahoo.com/newsroom.

Microsoft Corp. announced it has entered into an agreement to acquire Danger Inc., the company responsible for the software and services powering many popular consumer handsets. The acquisition will align Danger’s nearly 10 years of expertise in the mobile consumer space with Microsoft’s vision to provide innovative and compelling mobile experiences to a growing base of customers.”Microsoft is a global leader with our Windows Mobile software and expanding mobile services,” said Robbie Bach, president of the Entertainment and Devices Division at Microsoft. “The addition of Danger serves as a perfect complement to our existing software and services, and also strengthens our dedication to improving mobile experiences centered around individuals and what they like.” The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company provides services that allow people to keep in touch, stay organized and keep informed while on the go through real-time mobile messaging, social networking services and other applications - all blended together on a single phone that is intuitive and customizable.

“Danger continues to provide an effortless and fun mobile experience for consumers,” said Henry R. Nothhaft, chairman and CEO of Danger Inc. “Now by combining our uncompromised application software and powerful back-end service with Microsoft, we can expand our innovative service offerings even further and take mobility to a new level.”

A Grasp on Consumers

Danger has connected with a customer base that is young and enthusiastic, Internet-savvy and socially inclined. The Danger team has a deep understanding of consumers and a hold on what people want from mobility, making it an ideal group to work with in delivering connected experiences. Adding Danger to the Entertainment and Devices Division will provide Microsoft with additional assets and resources that will accelerate the company’s entry into the consumer space and complement the company’s focus on delivering innovative technologies and services that connect people’s entertainment and information.

Danger will further expand people’s mobile options by bringing a variety of established partnerships to the mix. Microsoft software can be found on more than 160 mobile phones made by more than 50 hardware partners, which are offered through more than 160 mobile operators around the world.

Boingo Wireless Inc., which provides access to the world’s largest network of Wi-Fi hotspots, and JiWire, the leading provider of Ads for Access at premier Wi-Fi locations, today announced that Boingo has selected JiWire to sell and serve advertising on its Wi-Fi airport networks. Boingo users will see JiWire-supplied advertising throughout the Boingo Wi-Fi login process at 28 major U.S. and U.K. airports, including Atlanta-Hartsfield, JFK and LaGuardia in New York, Chicago’s O’Hare and Heathrow in London.”Mobile professionals and affluent technology enthusiasts represent an elusive demographic coveted by advertisers,” said Dawn Callahan, vice president, consumer marketing, Boingo Wireless. “The JiWire network includes everything we need to monetize our valuable advertising inventory, including advertiser procurement and management, advertising localization and per-device customization, and advertisement scheduling, tracking, and reporting.”

The JiWire Wi-Fi Advertising Network enables targeted delivery of premium advertisements based on the recipient’s location and device. As an example, the network will enable targeting of advertisements delivered to Boingo users at specific airports. Advertisers on the JiWire network include Charles Schwab, Microsoft, Nokia, and Toshiba.

“The JiWire Wi-Fi Advertising Network has become the leading source of premium, location-aware Wi-Fi advertising,” said Kevin McKenzie, chief executive officer, JiWire. “With Boingo’s impressive reach into almost 40% of passenger traffic in the top 100 North American airports and coverage throughout the major airports in United Kingdom, we are now able to offer our advertisers unparalleled opportunities to capture mobile professionals at the world’s largest airports.”

Research In Motion (RIM) today announced a series of updates for its market-leading BlackBerry platform that include enhanced messaging and collaboration, simpler management, enhanced security and expanded application development support. These updates will benefit users, IT groups and developers and will enable organizations to increase mobility, productivity and return on investment.Enhanced Messaging and Collaboration

The BlackBerry Enterprise Solution is a complete, end-to-end wireless platform that extends the benefits of an organization’s messaging and collaboration environment to mobile users. Updates to the BlackBerry Enterprise Server and BlackBerry device software(1) will enable customers to further enhance usability and increase end-user productivity.

- Document Downloading and Editing - As a result of the integration of the ‘Documents To Go by DataViz’ software with the BlackBerry platform, users will be able to edit Microsoft Office Word, PowerPoint and Excel files(2) directly on their BlackBerry smartphone.

- Remote Search for Messages - Users will be able to search for and retrieve email messages from their email server even if the message is no longer stored on their BlackBerry smartphone.

- Free-Busy Calendar Lookup - Users on the go will be able to check the availability of colleagues before sending a meeting request.

- HTML and Rich Text Email Rendering - BlackBerry smartphone users will be able to view HTML and rich text email messages with original formatting preserved including font colors and styles, embedded images, hyperlinks, tables, bullets and other formatting.

- Advanced Enterprise Instant Messaging and Presence - New features for users running IBM Lotus Sametime and Microsoft Live Communications Server will include improved address book integration, IM contact “click to call”, IM session “convert to call” and advanced emoticon support, allowing co-workers to collaborate and communicate more effectively using their BlackBerry smartphones.

Simpler Management and Support

BlackBerry Enterprise Server provides IT groups with industry-leading management and support capabilities. New features will further improve and simplify the administration of BlackBerry deployments.

- BlackBerry Monitoring Service - A new software component of the BlackBerry Enterprise Server will help organizations maintain high availability and high performance of their BlackBerry infrastructure by providing administrators with enhanced monitoring, alerting, troubleshooting and reporting capabilities. BlackBerry Monitoring Service will be included in the next release of BlackBerry Enterprise Server(3).

- BlackBerry Web Desktop Manager - A web-based device management console has been designed to increase deployment flexibility and simplify software upgrades by reducing the number of BlackBerry software components installed on end-user workstations. BlackBerry Web Desktop Manager enables users to install software and manage their BlackBerry smartphone from any browser-enabled computer. The software is available now as a free download from: www.blackberry.com/go/webdesktop.

- Over-the-Air Device Software Upgrades(4) - Organizations will be able to update a user’s BlackBerry device software wirelessly, delivering a fast, cost-effective method for remotely supporting users and managing BlackBerry device software lifecycles.

- Expanded Systems Compatibility - BlackBerry Enterprise Server v4.1.5 is certified with Microsoft Exchange 2007 SP1 and supports IBM Lotus Domino versions 7.03 and 8.0.

Enhanced Security

Security is a cornerstone of the BlackBerry Enterprise Solution and today there are over 400 IT policy settings and controls that an administrator can set to centrally manage and enforce security policies. Newly introduced IT policies further enhance the security and control of a BlackBerry deployment(5).

- Encrypted Attachment Viewing - Users will be able view attachments within encrypted PGP and S/MIME messages.

- Increased Control over GPS - Administrators will have the ability to control which applications access GPS functionality on BlackBerry smartphones.

- Increased Bluetooth Controls - Administrators will have the ability to enable or disable certain Bluetooth profiles as well as set the allowable ‘discoverable time’.

Expanded Application Development Support

RIM continues to expand the opportunities for software developers to create innovative and powerful wireless applications that leverage the inherent security, network efficiency, reliability and push capabilities of the BlackBerry platform and take advantage of new BlackBerry smartphone features. With the recent release of the BlackBerry Java Development Environment (JDE) v4.3.0, new Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) have been added to the thousands previously available, enabling developers to offer even more robust and exciting business and lifestyle applications to the more than 12 million BlackBerry subscribers around the world. In addition, support for the following Java Micro Edition APIs is also now available:

- JSR 205: Wireless Messaging 2.0 (MMS Support) - provides the ability to send and receive messages that include images, sound and video via Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS).

- JSR 211: Content Handler API (CHAPI) - allows applications to invoke other applications, including native BlackBerry applications, to handle specific content types.

- JSR 238: Internationalization - allows developers to easily create a single application for multiple languages and regions across the globe with proper location-specific language, time conventions, currencies, and number formats.

- JSR 172: Web Services - enables developers to quickly develop and deploy applications that act as web services clients.

These new BlackBerry platform enhancements are scheduled to be phased in to new software releases during the first half of 2008 and will be showcased at Lotusphere this week.

1) Requires BlackBerry Enterprise Server v4.1.5 and BlackBerry device software v4.5 or above.

2) Microsoft Office Word and PowerPoint files will be supported in conjunction with BlackBerry device software v4.5 and Microsoft Excel files will be supported in conjunction with a subsequent software release expected later in the year.

3) Included in BlackBerry Enterprise Server v4.1.5 for Microsoft Exchange and IBM Lotus Domino, and included in BlackBerry Enterprise Server v4.1.4 for GroupWise.

4) Requires BlackBerry Enterprise Server v4.1.4 and BlackBerry device software v4.5 or above.

5) Requires BlackBerry Enterprise Server v4.1.5 and BlackBerry device software v4.5 or above.

“A venture led by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen has applied to bid in an upcoming U.S. auction of coveted wireless airwaves, according to auction documents released late on Tuesday.”

“Microsoft began on Monday to place advertisements on its U.S. MSN Mobile page, moving into the nascent mobile phone advertising business.”

Palm, Inc. announced the Palm(R) Treo(TM) 750 smartphone, previously available in the United States only on AT&T’s 3G network, is now available in an unlocked version via Palm’s retail (http://www.palm.com/retail) and online stores (http://store.palm.com). The unlocked GSM Treo 750 smartphone comes with the Windows Mobile 6 operating system, allowing an even broader customer base to enjoy the benefits of increased functionality and HSDPA (High-speed Download Packet Access) capability out of the box.(1)Also available from carriers around the world, the Treo 750 is a five-band world phone. It’s a key asset to worldwide businesses and employees who travel internationally, as well as an effective productivity tool for any user working on the road.

“The Treo 750 smartphone integrates Palm’s ease of use with the new features of Windows Mobile 6 to bring the familiar desktop experience to mobile professionals,” said Brent Remai, vice president of business and consumer marketing, Palm, Inc. “Palm and Microsoft’s alliance continues to provide office productivity in any away-from-the-desk setting through Direct Push Technology and a robust application portfolio.”

Windows Mobile 6 and Exchange Server 2007 support is available out of the box and delivers a wide range of enhanced features, including the following:

– Direct Push Technology connection to email, calendar, contacts and tasks;(2)

– Email enhancements such as HTML-formatted email messages;(1)

– Ability to set an out-of-office message from the Treo smartphone;(1)

– Mini-SD storage card encryption, password and PIN improvements, and remote data wipe;(1)

– Ability to search for email messages on the Exchange Server;(1)

– Meeting request and scheduling conflict improvements;(1) and

– Improved calendar with day-at-a-glance bar.

The Treo 750 offers the hallmark Palm experience in a multifunction phone with access to email, Palm’s exclusive threaded text messaging, web browsing and organization software all in a compact design.(1) Added features such as Windows Live increases communication capabilities by letting users send voice recordings via Live Messenger and integrating Outlook and Live Contacts to show who is online directly from the Contacts screen. The device is compatible with HSDPA, allowing faster data-download speeds on 3G/UMTS/HSDPA networks.(1)

Palm offers a unique suite of software enhancements to Treo 750 users, including the following:

– Threaded chat view for text and MMS messages;

– Today Screen enhancements, such as the ability to “dial by name,” search the web directly and perform one-touch dialing with personalized photo speed dials;

– Call and voicemail control from the Today Screen with VCR-like icons, such as rewind, delete and fast-forward; and

– Ability to ignore a call and quickly send a text message such as “In a meeting” or “Can’t talk right now” by selecting the “Ignore with text” option from the incoming-call screen.

Tomorrow, consumers ready for a richer, more connected and more personal entertainment experience will have the first opportunity to get their hands on sleek new Zune players, redesigned Zune software, and new online services including the Zune Marketplace and Zune Social, an online music community. The players, along with dozens of accessories, will be available at retailers across the United States, while the new Zune software will be available for free download at http://www.zune.net.For the first time, consumers also will have the option to customize their Zune player with laser-engraved designs and personal text through a new Web store called Zune Originals. Customers will be able to purchase a Zune player directly from Microsoft at http://www.zuneoriginals.net and choose from a collection of laser-engraved artwork designed exclusively for Zune by 18 internationally recognized artists.

Zune Originals Gives Consumers a New Canvas

Consumers no longer need to settle for the same portable media player as everybody else. The new Zune Originals online store will let people make a unique statement by customizing their Zune with laser-engraved art or personal text. Zune worked with 18 accomplished artists from all over the world to create a collection of 27 different designs, called the Artist Series, which will be available exclusively through Zune Originals. In addition to the Artist Series, a separate Tattoo Series will feature 20 graphics that consumers can have laser-engraved on their Zune with up to three lines of text. Alternatively, people can choose to engrave up to five lines of text in place of a design. On the Zune Originals Web site, customers can choose their Zune (Zune 80GB, Zune 8GB or Zune 4GB), pick a color and then select a design and their desired text.

The Zune Originals Artist Series will launch with designs from artists Colletivo Studios, Catalina Estrada, Laurent Fetis, Sam Flores, Klaus Haapaniemi, Pierre Marie, Kenzo Minami, Parskid, Mike Perry, Phunk Studios, Chisato Shinya, Skwak, Iosefatu Sua, Tado, Nobumasa Takahashi, Ramiro Torres, Darvin Vida and Steve Wilson.

Zune Entertainment Experience Expands

Together with the original Zune 30GB, the new models and customization options make it easier for consumers to find the size, color, design and price that best suits them. Three new Zune models will be on store shelves tomorrow: the black Zune 80GB, which has a bright 3.2-inch screen and comes with premium in-ear noise-isolating headphones (ERP $249.99), and the slim, ultra-portable Zune 4GB (ERP $149.99) and the Zune 8GB (ERP $199.99), both available in pink, green, black and red. The new Zune models also feature the new Zune Pad, a touch-sensitive navigation button that lets people fly through menus or lists with the flick of their thumb, or click to easily change songs or adjust the volume. Every Zune player includes wireless sync and wireless sharing, a built-in FM tuner, and a bright color screen to display music, pictures, videos and podcasts. Existing Zune owners will receive all new software features via a free and easy upgrade, available Nov 13.

The updated design of the new Zune players is complemented by smart new software and a dramatic new look and feel for Zune Marketplace. The new Zune software takes digital music to a new level of simplicity, while connecting consumers to a richer, more interactive entertainment experience through Zune Marketplace and the new Zune Social online music community. Zune is set apart from its competitors by having all the following features:

*Wireless sync. Consumers can set their Zune to automatically sync to their PC collection via a home wireless network whenever it’s placed in its dock or plugged in to charge, making it easy to keep the Zune updated with the latest music or podcasts. Consumers can also manually start a wireless sync from their device as soon as they are within range of their wireless network.

*Wireless sharing. Share select music, pictures and audio podcasts with other Zune devices nearby. Consumers can listen to any received song up to three times and even pass it along to other friends with a Zune.

*Redesigned Zune software. Easily drag and drop music, videos and photos to simple icons to sync content to a Zune, create playlists or burn CDs. A new search feature gives consumers one master view across music, videos and podcasts. Search for an artist to find all relevant content — what’s already in a consumer’s collection and what’s available in Zune Marketplace.

*Zune Social. Consumers can find music they like by seeing what other like-minded individuals are listening to. People can create customizable Zune Cards, which update automatically based on the music they listen to on their Zune and via the Zune software on their PC. See what friends are listening to, play samples of music directly from others’ Zune Cards, send song recommendations or browse artist pages. When consumers find something they like, they can link directly to Zune Marketplace to buy it.

*Updated Zune Marketplace. The new Zune Marketplace is designed to make it fun to browse. Choose from over 3 million songs and a broad collection of albums, music videos, podcasts, and digital rights management (DRM)-free MP3s to download and sync to a Zune.

*Zune Pass. For about the price of one CD per month ($14.99 per month), consumers can get flat-rate access to millions of available songs. They also have the option to buy songs, albums and music videos individually.

*Recorded television content to go. The Zune software will now import broadcast content recorded on Microsoft Windows Media Center for Windows Vista Home Premium or Windows Vista Ultimate, so consumers can sync it to their Zune.

*FM tuner. Consumers can tune into their favorite FM radio stations on the go. Zune will even display the name of the song and the artist, using Radio Broadcast Data System (RBDS) information from stations that broadcast it.

“Microsoft and Siemens will join forces to develop in-car entertainment and navigation products that should make it easier for consumers to connect devices such mobile phones and music players.”

Nokia, the world’s largest mobile device manufacturer, and Microsoft, a global leader in online communications and communities, have joined together to provide customers with a new suite of Windows Live services specifically designed for Nokia devices. Starting today Nokia customers in eleven countries with compatible S60 devices can download the new suite enabling access to Windows Live Hotmail, Windows Live Messenger, Windows Live Contacts and Windows Live Spaces. Starting next year, customers who purchase compatible Nokia Series 40 handsets will also have access to these popular Windows Live services.Nokia and Microsoft are empowering the “mobile lifestyle,” by providing mobile customers with easy access to their world of online relationships, information and interests. By enabling access to Windows Live services on both the Nokia S60 and Series 40 platforms using standard web services protocols our mutual customers will have the power to seamlessly move between contacts, mail, messenger, phone calls, text messaging, camera, gallery and browsing all in an integrated way.

“By taking advantage of the extensive and agile distribution network that Nokia has, we have the opportunity to bring the power of Windows Live services to Nokia devices, thus ensuring our customers can take their most important online information with them on the go,” said Jari Pasanen, vice-president, Strategy and Technology, Nokia Multimedia.

Nokia customers who own the Nokia N73, N76, N80 Internet Edition, N93i, and the N95 multimedia computers can get the Windows Live services via the Download! application in the following countries; Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, UK, Sweden, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Customers can visit http://www.nokia.com/windowslive to learn more, and check if their country is on the availability list. Initially the service will be available as a free trial and then customers in select markets wishing to continue using the service may be asked to pay a monthly fee.

“The availability of Windows Live services for Nokia’s devices demonstrates our commitment to delivering great mobile experiences and extending people’s online lives - taking it from the PC to the device,” said Steve Berkowitz, senior vice president of the Online Services Business from Microsoft. “The alliance will enable a much broader group of consumers to experience the benefits Windows Live has to offer, easily connecting them to the information and people that matter most from virtually anywhere.”

Today’s announcement builds on the existing co-operation between Nokia and Microsoft, which integrated Microsoft’s Live Search for Mobile into the Nokia Mobile Search application. Nokia also plans to extend this service onto the Series 40 platform to enhance the search experience across a greater range of devices.

“On Thursday, 16th August 2007, the Skype peer-to-peer network became unstable and suffered a critical disruption. The disruption was triggered by a massive restart of our users’ computers across the globe within a very short timeframe as they re-booted after receiving a routine set of patches through Windows Update.The high number of restarts affected Skype’s network resources. This caused a flood of log-in requests, which, combined with the lack of peer-to-peer network resources, prompted a chain reaction that had a critical impact.

Normally Skype’s peer-to-peer network has an inbuilt ability to self-heal, however, this event revealed a previously unseen software bug within the network resource allocation algorithm which prevented the self-healing function from working quickly. Regrettably, as a result of this disruption, Skype was unavailable to the majority of its users for approximately two days.

The issue has now been identified explicitly within Skype. We can confirm categorically that no malicious activities were attributed or that our users’ security was not, at any point, at risk.

This disruption was unprecedented in terms of its impact and scope. We would like to point out that very few technologies or communications networks today are guaranteed to operate without interruptions.

We are very proud that over the four years of its operation, Skype has provided a technically resilient communications tool to millions of people worldwide. Skype has now identified and already introduced a number of improvements to its software to ensure that our users will not be similarly affected in the unlikely possibility of this combination of events recurring.

The Skype community of users has been incredibly supportive and we are very grateful for all their good wishes.”

According to new research report from the analyst firm Berg Insight, global shipments of smartphones running advanced operating systems will reach 113 million units in 2007. Increasing at an average annual compound growth rate 25.6 percent, shipments are forecasted to reach 365 million units by 2012. Smartphones will then account for over 22 percent of all handsets worldwide, compared to 10 percent today.Berg Insight estimates that Symbian OS was the leading smartphone operating system in 2006 with a market share of 63 percent. Linux was the second largest platform, followed by Windows Mobile. “Nokia’s commitment to Symbian OS as the core of the S60 platform is the key to its success,” said Andre Malm, telecom analyst, Berg Insight. “In the future there will however be increasingly strong competition from Linux for consumer devices and Windows Mobile in the enterprise segment.”

Microsoft’s performance in the smartphone segment is consistently improving, even though Windows Mobile is still far from threatening either Symbian OS or Linux for the top market positions. The once popular PDA operating system Palm OS has virtually disappeared from the market and is now being converted into a version of Linux. Apple’s OS X will become a new entrant on the smartphone operating systems market this year with the launch of the iPhone.

Monday at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) 2007, Microsoft Corp. and nine industry-leading companies — ASUSTek Computer Inc., GN, LG-Nortel Co. Ltd., NEC Corp., Plantronics Inc., Polycom Inc., SAMSUNG, Tatung Co. and ViTELiX — will introduce a new generation of devices that connect the workplace phone to e-mail, instant messaging, real-time presence information, conferencing, voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and mobile communications.Beginning tomorrow, a new wave of phones and devices will become available for use in the public beta program of Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 and Microsoft Office Communicator 2007. Microsoft is providing the device manufacturers with design specifications, helping to assure customers that the new phones and devices work easily with Office Communications Server and Office Communicator.

“Today’s office phone is marooned on an island, separate from the rest of the communications tools that information workers rely on to do their jobs,” said Jeff Raikes, president of the Microsoft Business Division. “By weaving the business phone together with e-mail, instant messaging, presence, conferencing and the productivity software people use most, we are putting voice communications back into business.”

Using an open approach and published software interfaces, Microsoft is enabling companies to innovate new workplace phones and devices that make business communications more effective and productive. The products are nearing the end of the Microsoft qualification cycle, which will help ensure the devices and phones deliver the following:

*”Just Works” experience. The qualified phones and devices work out of the box with Microsoft unified communications software. It’s as simple as plug-and-play.

*Greater choice and innovation. With an active partner community building phones and devices, customers are offered more choices when it comes to designs, cost and feature innovations. The 15 phones and devices to be unveiled tomorrow include Internet protocol (IP) phones, Universal Serial Bus (USB) phones, wired and wireless headsets, conferencing phones, LCD monitors and laptops.

*Improved economics. Because many companies will deliver Microsoft-qualified devices, customers will have more options, including devices tailored to the needs of specific types of workers and that deliver more value for less cost. According to Gartner Inc., “handsets typically cost around 40 percent to 45 percent of the total telephony installation.”