AllThingsD » Sharp

Sharp Sells Stake to Hon Hai in Watershed for Japan Tech Sector

Juro Osawa — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 17:15:27 +0000

Sharp Corp., once a proud titan of Japan’s electronics industry, said Tuesday it would sell nearly a 10 percent stake to Taiwan’s Hon Hai Group, and struck an accord with its new shareholder to shake up its core — but loss-making — liquid crystal display panel operations.

Sharp will issue new shares worth ¥66.91 billion ($808 million) to Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. and its group companies in the biggest investment ever in a Japanese company by a Taiwanese one. Hon Hai, the world’s largest contract maker by revenue of electronic products, will also take half of Sharp’s 92.96 percent stake in its LCD panel factory in Sakai, western Japan.

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How Japan's Sharp Lost Its Edge

Daisuke Wakabayashi and Juro Osawa — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 20:37:01 +0000

Sharp Corp.’s domestic liquid-crystal-display factories once made the company a source of pride for Japan’s electronics sector. Now it has taken on a less impressive mantle: Symbol of a sector struggling to compete globally.

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Worry About an Apple Television? Don't Make Samsung Laugh.

John Paczkowski — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 11:24:34 +0000

Smug complacency.

That seems to be the standard TV industry response to rumors of an Apple HDTV. Back in December, Sharp’s Kozo Takahashi dismissed the potential threat Apple might pose to the TV market, saying consumers are far more focused on price, picture quality and size than on any advanced technology and design innovation Cupertino might bring to bear on its rumored television.

Today, it’s Samsung’s AV product manager Chris Moseley who doesn’t think Apple has the R&D chops to field a formidable TV.

“We’ve not seen what they’ve done, but what we can say is that they don’t have 10,000 people in R&D in the vision category,” Moseley told Pocket Lint. “They don’t have the best scaling engine in the world and they don’t have world renowned picture quality that has been awarded more than anyone else. … There is no way that anyone, new or old, can come along this year or next year and beat us on picture quality.”

Perhaps. Samsung’s clearly got a lot of expertise in display picture quality. But presumably Apple’s got some applicable experience here, too, thanks to its own desktop display offerings and the Retina display. And as Brian Ford notes, it’s rarely wise to bet against Apple, even if you are an incumbent. Just ask former Palm CEO Ed Colligan, who famously dismissed Apple’s chances in the smartphone market back in 2006:

“We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone,” Colligan said at the time. “PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.”

Of course, that’s exactly what happened. And Colligan’s career at Palm didn’t even last long enough for him to eat those words.

At CES 2012, 3-D Is Riding Shotgun to "Smart" TVs

Lauren Goode — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:48:29 +0000

After years of flogging 3-D TVs at the annual Consumer Electronics Show, television makers are trying a different tactic.

For 2012, they are focusing on making TVs “smarter” by enabling them to connect to the Internet for apps and video services on the Web.

But that doesn’t mean 3-D is going away. It’s just riding shotgun with smart TVs.

Smart TV is not a new concept, of course. Up until now, it has been defined as Internet-connected television achieved through a separate box or device that connects to the TV and streams Internet content, or via a computer-like processor built directly into the TV.

On the showroom floor in Las Vegas next week, electronics makers including Samsung Electronics, Sony and LG Electronics are expected to show off more television sets that bring Internet connectivity to entertainment centers for the home. Yesterday, Google announced that LG will join the list of companies supporting Google TV; Samsung, Sony, and Vizio Inc. have also adopted Google’s Internet TV technology.

With Apple rumored to have a possible Internet-connected HDTV in the pipeline, TV makers are making all kinds of pushes to bring to market devices that offer consumers a full range of options. For many consumers, the answer for now will still be external devices that offer easy, upgradable solutions, like the Microsoft Xbox, Apple TV, Google TV and even Roku’s latest gadget.

Analysts believe that Internet-enabled TVs will begin to take a larger share of the market by default, eventually becoming a check-off item for consumers, rather than a special feature. Some 60 percent of new televisions being sold in 2012 are expected to have Internet connectivity. According to NPD’s DisplaySearch, connected-TV shipments are expected to reach 138 million globally by 2015, accounting for 47 percent of all flat-panel TVs.

So where does 3-D fit into all this?

TV makers will still be touting 3-D at CES 2012, as many smart TVs will also include 3-D capabilities. Samsung Electronics, for instance, says that more than half of its 2012 TV models will support 3-D. “Our commitment to 3-D is only deepening,” says Ethan Raisel, director of communications at Samsung.

Tim Alessi, Director of New Product Development at LG, estimates that around 20 percent of all LG TV units will support 3-D, and notes that 3-D is featured in 50 percent of the company’s lineup for this year.

But despite the fact that 3-D TV sales in 2011 showed some encouraging gains — with an estimated 21.5 million 3-D units reported to have shipped last year and sales showing significant gains from quarter to quarter — the forced exuberance over three-dimensional screens has been tempered a bit.

That’s likely because it doesn’t matter how well 3-D TV units are selling — for the consumer, anyway. “It’s not really the penetration that matters, it’s the use,” says Forrester Research analyst James McQuivey. “You’d be hard pressed to find a 3-D TV owner that actually uses it in 3-D mode even once a week. That’s not a formula for building consumer momentum.”

For TV, 3-D presents a three-headed monster: To start, there are the technical and psychological obstacles of those pesky 3-D glasses — and while autostereoscopic (glasses-free) 3-D technology is being worked on in many R&D labs, industry experts all agree that quality 3-D without glasses is at least a few years away.

Secondly, 3-D presents a chicken-and-egg dilemma that doesn’t exist with smart-TV features — the question of where the viewable content will come from. Many content creators have been holding off on making 3-D programs. The Discovery Channel and ESPN made headlines two years ago when they announced 3-D channels; but in terms of sports, 3-D has been relegated to key events, due to high production costs.

An increasing number of 3-D movies are available on DVD, but moviemakers that hopped aboard the 3-D train early — think Pixar Animation Studios and DreamWorks Animation — were likely doing so to plant a flag in the ground for when 3-D finally does hit critical mass in the living room, says Scott Steinberg, head of strategic consulting firm TechSavvy.

Sony Chairman and CEO Howard Stringer even said recently, regarding the company’s 3-D TV push, that he hadn’t realized all of the challenges in getting 3-D content in place.

And the third issue affecting the uptake of 3-D has been the cost of the sets. On average, the cost of 47-inch to 50-inch 3-D TV sets is $400 more than similar HDTVs, according to a 2011 report from Retrevo. And while the entire consumer electronics industry has been hurt by a weak U.S. economy, TV sales have been hit particularly hard.

Steinberg says that for the average American household, television purchasing is about being practical right now. “It’s much more important to have the maximum-value TV with Internet capabilities and apps, than to invest in a still-unproven technology like 3-D.”

A December 2011 report from Parks & Associates on consumer purchasing intent also indicates that smart TVs are what’s grabbing the interest of consumers right now.

Even that report points out that smart TVs won’t deliver the killer blow to 3-D. As smart TVs are punched up with even more features — from apps to motion remotes to voice-command capabilities — more middle-class households looking to purchase smart TVs may buy in to 3-D, whether they’re actively looking for it or not.

Whether consumers actually want to sit in their living rooms and wear 3-D glasses to watch TV remains to be seen. For now, TV makers will still insist that they do.

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LCD Makers Cough Up $538 Million to Settle Price-Fixing Charges

John Paczkowski — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 23:24:54 +0000

A coterie of seven liquid-crystal display makers have agreed to settle antitrust claims that they were colluding with one another to fix the prices of LCD panels.

Samsung, Hitachi, Sharp, Chimei Innolux, Chunghwa Picture Tubes, Epson Imaging Devices and HannStar Display, as well as some of their affiliates, will pay $538 million to settle allegations brought by eight state attorneys general that they conspired over eight years to fix prices on LCDs used in everything from computer monitors and notebooks to televisions and mobile phones.

Of that sum, about $501 million will be used to subsidize a refund program for consumers. The remainder will be distributed to the state governments of Arkansas, California, Florida, Michigan, Missouri, New York, West Virginia and Wisconsin to settle their penalty claims. The settling companies have also agreed to participate in antitrust compliance programs.

(Image courtesy of Flickr user Frank Gruber)

Supply Chain Chatter Has Two Apple TVs Targeted for Midyear Launch

John Paczkowski — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 18:50:38 +0000

The rumored Apple television now has a rumored launch date and a few rumored screen sizes as well.

Supply chain sources tell the occasionally reliable Digitimes that Apple hopes to launch the device in either the second or third quarter of 2012 and that initially it will be available in two sizes, 32 inches and 37 inches. The so called “iTV” will reportedly run on a Samsung chip and feature modified amorphous TFT LCD displays manufactured by Sharp, which has been rumored to be retooling a production line at one of its factories specifically to manufacture them.

Assuming Digitimes’ report is accurate, which is a big assumption, Apple would seem to be gearing up to disrupt yet another industry with one of its trademark seismic shifts. And if it succeeds, the rewards could be massive.

UBS analyst Maynard Um says Apple stands to gain an incremental $50 billion to $100 billion in market cap if it manages a successful television-set offering, one that not only stands out from the competition but steals market share away from it, as the iPhone has from incumbent smartphone manufacturers.

PREVIOUSLY:

What if Apple Television Is an iMac?

Apple’s iTV Could Have a Sharp Picture

Apple TV? Think Bose VideoWave, Only More Apple-ish.

Google, KKR Set California Solar Deal

Ryan Dezember — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 14:00:08 +0000

Google Inc. and KKR & Co. Inc. are expected to announce today a joint investment in a California solar-power project, showing investor interest in the industry amid expiring government incentives.

The Internet giant and private-equity firm will become majority owners of four solar farms south of Sacramento, according to people familiar with the matter. Recurrent Energy, the project’s developer and a subsidiary of Sharp Corp., will remain a minority owner and operate the facilities, these people said.

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Sharp Selling Too Many Big-Ass TVs to Worry About Apple Television

John Paczkowski — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 21:21:25 +0000

Sharp isn’t paying much heed to rumors that Apple is developing an HDTV. Nor does it have much reason to, says Kozo Takahashi, head of the company’s operations in North and South America.

“Currently it’s not something we’re studying very hard,” Takahashi said during a press conference in Osaka, though he conceded that whatever TV Apple has in the pipeline — if indeed there is one — could certainly “catch the market by surprise.”

But for the time being, Sharp’s not going to spend any time worrying about it. According to Takahashi, TV buyers in the United States right now are far more focused on price, picture quality and size than any advanced technology Apple might bring to bear on its rumored television.

And right now, Sharp is killing it in the big TV market.

Earlier this year, the company said it expected to sell at least one million TVs 60-inches or larger in the U.S. and Canada in the current fiscal year. Now it expects to hit that target in the U.S. alone. Said Takahashi, “I didn’t think sales would turn out to be this strong.”

Apple's iTV Could Have a Sharp Picture

John Paczkowski — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 12:40:31 +0000

There may be more to Apple’s developing relationship with Sharp than simple supply-chain diversification and OLED panels for future iPhones and iPads. The Japanese company is said to be playing a role in the production of the long-rumored Apple television.

Over at Jeffries, analyst Peter Misek suggests that Sharp is retooling a production line at its factory in Sakai specifically to manufacture modified amorphous TFT LCD panels that will be used in the so-called iTV. If all goes well, the line should be ready for commercial production by February of 2012, which means we could see Apple’s take on the TV by midyear.

But what form it will take remains a mystery — one that the entire TV industry is evidently eager to solve. “Based on our discussions, interestingly other TV manufacturers have begun a scrambling search to identify what iTV will be and do,” says Misek. “They hope to avoid the fate of other industries and manufacturers who were caught flat footed by Apple.”

Good luck with that, guys. Without Apple’s software acumen — or a rival to its new iCloud service, which will incorporate video sooner or later — that’s a tall order.

Says Misek: “Mainstream TV manufacturers are likely to be at least 6 to 12 months behind in a best-case scenario.”

Apple Mulling Sharp Adjustment in LCD Screen Supply

John Paczkowski — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 18:25:15 +0000

Apple may be seeking a bit more control over its component sources amid heightening demand for the LCD screens found in today’s smartphones and tablets.

MF Global FXA Securities analyst David Rubenstein says the company is considering a $1 billion investment in a Sharp LCD plant. “We think it is highly possible that Apple will make an investment in Sharp’s Kameyama plant to the tune of around US$1 billion in order to secure a stable supply of screens for iPhones and iPads,” Rubenstein wrote in a note to clients today.

Though unconfirmed at this point, such a move would make perfect sense for Apple, which must surely be looking to diversify its component suppliers as a hedge against supply chain disruptions, whether they be caused by industrial accidents, natural disasters or ongoing patent disputes with key suppliers like Samsung.

Sony Unlikely to Raise Stake In Sharp Venture by End of Month

Juro Osawa and Daisuke Wakabayashi — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 12:00:00 +0000

Sony Corp. is unlikely to raise its stake in its liquid crystal panel production joint venture with Sharp Corp. by the end of this month as originally planned, people familiar with the matter said Tuesday.

Sony, which currently holds a seven percent stake in Sharp Display Products Corp., had planned to raise that stake to 34 percent by the end of this month. The two Japanese electronics makers signed an agreement in July 2009 to set up the joint venture, which produces LCD panels at Sharp’s Sakai plant in Osaka.

Production is currently temporarily suspended at Sharp’s two LCD panel plants–its Sakai plant and Kameyama plant in Mie Prefecture–after the March 11 earthquake.

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The Nintendo 3DS Appears Pretty Profitable, Judging by the Teardown

Arik Hesseldahl — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 13:30:05 +0000

Nintendo’s latest handheld gaming device has hit the market in Europe and North America and as so often happens, before the weekend was over my in-box contained a detailed teardown report from the team at IHS iSuppli.

As usual, the idea behind the teardown is not only to figure out who Nintendo’s component suppliers are and what parts are being used, but to estimate how much all the components cost to help guess how much of a profit margin Nintendo is making on each unit. And it looks like a decent margin. ISuppli says the cost of all the parts in the device itself plus what’s in the box amount to $103.25 for a device that’s selling at retail for $249. The cost works out to an increase of about $25 over the Nintendo DSi, the most recent Nintendo handheld, released in 2009, which cost about $78, when iSuppli tore it apart that year.

While most of the components come from Japan, it’s not entirely clear if the supply of any of the parts used come from areas affected by the earthquake and tsunami, says Andrew Rassweiler, an iSuppli analyst who supervised the teardown. “Many of these component should have a greater risk exposure to supply chain problems, though we don’t know about any specific disruptions at this point,” he said.

The most expensive component, as is often the case with consumer electronics, is the displays. The 3DS uses two Sharp displays that cost a combined $33.80. The headliner is the top screen 3D. It’s a 3.5-inch 800-by-240 pixel display that uses an LCD-based parallax barrier panel sandwiched to the back of the color LCD which alternates between the left and right images at a high rate of speed to produce the 3D effect. “It looks like a conventional LCD from the outside, but when you open the display you see that on one side of the glass is essentially the conventional color element, and on the other side of the glass is a monochrome element,” Rassweiler told me. “It’s a clever bit of display engineering.”

The handheld’s main chip is an applications processor. It’s a custom ARM-based chip manufactured by Sharp, that at a cost of $10.02 is only slightly more expensive than the chip in the previous Nintendo DSi. However, Nintendo has quadrupled the amount of flash memory in the 3DS versus the DSi to 16 gigabytes, and Samsung, the world’s largest manufacturer of flash, supplied it. Fujitsu supplied another type of memory known as fast-cycle RAM. Rassweiler says for this particular type of memory, Nintendo has used a type of chip that’s only made by Fujitsu, which is odd because FCRAM is widely available, and its unusual for consumer electronics manufacturers to “single source”–that is, rely upon a single supplier for an important component. The combined cost of memory on the 3DS worked out to $8.36, more than twice the cost of the memory found on the DSi.

Three chips related to the user interface cost a combined $6.81: an accelerometer from STMicroelectroncis, a gyroscope from Invensense, and an audio chip from Texas Instruments. Atheros, the Wi-Fi chipmaker that’s being acquired by Qualcomm, supplied a $5 Wi-Fi chip. TI and NEC supplied power management chips that cost $3.63. The 3DS contains three cameras, and though it’s not clear who supplied them–camera suppliers have gone to great lengths to hide their identities in recent years–iSuppli reckons their combined cost at $4.70.

Since I often get asked this question, let me say that iSuppli’s analysis focuses strictly on the materials used and doesn’t account for the cost to develop software or to license any patents. Nor does it account for the cost of any shipping or distribution or marketing. It’s just the raw cost of the hardware.

Google TV Going MIA at CES?

Peter Kafka — Mon, 20 Dec 2010 02:02:53 +0000

Conventional wisdom on Google TV: Not ready for prime time. Google apparently agrees: It has asked Toshiba, LG and Sharp not to show off their versions of the Web TV platform at the Consumer Electronics Show next month, the New York Times reports. But Samsung will display a new Google TV set on the show floor. And if you ask nicely, Vizio will show you one in private. Here’s Walt Mossberg’s November 17 review–”No Need to Tune In Just Yet.”

IPhone Now Fifth Most Popular Phone in Japan

John Paczkowski — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 11:16:09 +0000

A metric for skeptics who predicted the iPhone would fail in Japan: Apple’s handset is now the fifth-best-selling phone in the country, with 12.2 percent of the market, according to IDC.

This is the first time Apple’s cracked 10 percent in the Japanese market since the iPhone debuted there, so this is something of a milestone. More so when you consider that the company is now in spitting distance of incumbent Kyocera (12.7 percent) and not too far away from market leaders Sharp and Panasonic, which hold about 18.8 percent and 16.6 percent of the market, respectively.

And people said the iPhone would never be big in Japan….

[Image credit: iPhonAsia]

Sharp, LG Warn of TV Glut

Daisuke Wakabayashi and Jung-Ah Lee — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 18:33:55 +0000

Sharp Corp. and LG Electronics Inc. warned that a glut of inventory for flat-panel display televisions will continue to pressure prices during the critical year-end holiday shopping period.

The inventory build-up of liquid crystal display televisions is the result of a surge in production by global TV makers this year following a period of reduced output in the aftermath of the financial crisis, when consumer spending plunged. The flood of new models has heaped additional pressure on TV prices, which routinely experience 20 to 30 percent price declines annually.

The build-up has filtered down the supply chain. The market for large-sized LCD panels, which was experiencing shortages several months ago, has now swung in the opposite direction, forcing panel makers to scale back output and slash prices to clear out inventory.

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Big Sony Vs. Small Toshiba at Ceatec

Juro Osawa — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 12:00:21 +0000

Several themes are emerging at Japan’s largest annual electronics trade fair this week, including green technology, such as electric cars, and tablet devices, such as Sharp Corp.’s Galapagos and Samsung Electronics Co.’s Galaxy Tab.

And 3-D is among the main themes at the Combined Exhibition of Advanced Technologies, also known as Ceatec. If you are looking for a big-screen experience, Sony Corp.’s (SNE) section features a gigantic 21.7-meter-wide (roughly 71 feet) 3-D screen by combining liquid crystal display modules.

Every time Sony ran a demo clip using the entire screen for a few minutes, visitors stopped and picked up viewing glasses from the booth staff. When the demo clip wasn’t on, visitors could try out high-profile PlayStation titles such as Gran Turismo 5 in 3-D, using nearly half of the screen.

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"Galapagos": Sharp Picks Japanese Buzzword as E-Reader Name

Daisuke Wakabayashi — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 20:08:58 +0000

“Galapagos,” the name of the South American chain of islands where Charles Darwin observed the wondrous creatures that helped formulate his theory of evolution, has taken on new meaning in Japan.

Shortened from the phrase “Galapagos syndrome,” “Galapagos” is used as an umbrella adjective in Japan to describe the country’s growing isolation from the rest of the world. It is also tinged with the negative connotation of a country which sees itself in decline.

Need a word to describe the inability of many Japanese people to speak English well? Galapagos. How about the root cause for young Japanese workers not wanting to be sent abroad? Galapagos.

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Twitter Japan Tweeting All the Way to the Bank

Yoree Koh — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 17:31:46 +0000

Twitter’s Japanese arm may well be on its way to turning a profit next year the old-fashioned way: through ad sales.

Digital Garage Inc., the Tokyo-based technology company that provides Twitter to millions of Japanese chirpers, said the revenue of its newly restructured social-media unit is expected to more than double to 1.7 billion yen through June 2011, according to its revised midterm business plan. Twitter makes up more than half of that segment’s business, a Digital Garage spokeswoman said.

The company revamped the segment, called the “media incubation unit,” this year to focus on Twitter. It has generated some 200 million yen in ad sales in the first six months since it launched its advertising service in December, according to its annual financial report.

As of April, the logos of 82 Japanese companies, including Nissan, Panasonic and Sharp, appear in the ad slot of the Japanese-language Twitter site. The growing number of eyeballs skimming ads from Sony (SNE), mobile service Au and others will likely throw more dollars Digital Garage’s way.

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Sharp New Competition In the E-Reader Arena

Beth Callaghan — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 15:34:53 +0000

Japanese electronics giant Sharp announced today that it will launch two e-readers sometime this year with advanced multimedia capabilities that will support audio and video as well as text display. The gadgets–which will reportedly resemble Apple’s iPad and iPhone–will launch in Japan later this year, and will ship internationally in the near future.

Flat-Screen TV Prices Rising; When's the Right Time to Buy?

Yun-Hee Kim — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 07:00:55 +0000

Flat-screen TV prices have been rising since February, but now some analysts say prices could fall in the coming months.

Analysts base their predictions on the prices of liquid crystal displays — which are the most expensive component of a flat screen TV.

Prices of LCDs, used in everything from cellphones to flat-screen TVs, have started to fall after months of stable or rising prices. That’s because with the market in an upswing thanks to a recovery in the global economy, LCD makers, especially those in Taiwan, have started to ramp up capacity, running their factories at full utilization. With additional capacity coming on line from new production lines at Sharp, Samsung Electronics and LG Display, supply growth for LCDs is now outstripping demand.

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Liveblogging Microsoft's "Project Pink" Party–Plus Video! Will It Be Phonetastic?

Drake Martinet — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 15:30:31 +0000

Take two parts tech giant, mix with equal measures of new technology and PR, and garnish with a little mystery. Or at least that’s how to mix the perfect Apple-flavored product release.

Microsoft (MSFT) is trying a recipe from that cookbook, too, at its “social event,” which begins at 10 am PT.

No surprise, but Microsoft’s plans haven’t been met with quite the same media fury as the recent launches from hype-saturated Apple (AAPL). But perhaps today’s announcements will be the fresh new ingredients the software giant is looking for.

Hard details are scant, but most observers expect the event to be about of two smartphone devices (possibly named “Turtle” and “Pure”) that–together with a new Windows mobile operating system called Windows Phone 7–make up Microsoft’s secretive “Project Pink.”

Immediately below: A short video we put together after we got Microsoft’s new Kin 1 and 2–the names of the new devices, it turns out–in hand. And below the video, the liveblog text.

[ See post to watch video ]

9:22 am: We’re here at Mighty, the trendy gallery space chosen for today’s event. No phones yet, just a bunch of cold reporters and a Belgian waffle truck.

9:48 am: We’ve been let in and are getting settled. Mighty is a gallery space-cum-club with lots of exposed beams, techno-club style lighting and at least three disco balls–very Microsoft.

No one in the promo photos flashing on flat-screen TVs everywhere looks more than midtwenties.

Hmm. Wonder who Microsoft is targeting with the new devices?

9:58 am: Crowd is quieting down, lots of trendy tracks on the stereo here as the last people file in and take spots at a standing table. It has gotten pretty packed.

Just got the five-minute call from the disembodied lady voice on the PA.

10:05 am: We’re rolling. Robbie Bach, president of Microsoft’s mobile device division, takes the stage.

Name-drops Verizon (VZ), Sharp, Vodafone (VOD) in first sentence.

Now we’re watching a short video of young mobile users talking about their phone needs.

10:08 am: Young users in video are talking all about social. Facebook, Twitter and even MySpace.

Lots of talk about photos and sharing.

Now Bach is back on. He calls the people in the video part of the “Social Generation.” He says, “Their social life is priority Number One. Microsoft is answering this by incorporating different levels of friends into their lives.”

“Self expression is super important to these young social users. Like publishing a magazine of their life.” Bach calls it “Lifecasting.”

He says the third finding is that these people are “multiscreen” users.

10:11 am: Bach asks how they can incorporate those things into a phone for the first time.

Now Bach is talking about Windows Phone 7 and says that it was designed for a broad audience.

This product, it seems, will be built on a small, specialized version of Windows Phone 7.

10:13 am: Bach says, “Windows Phone 7 is about simplifying life. This social version is about ‘amplifying’ life.”

He says that today Microsoft will be announcing a phone called Kin.

10:15 am: Now Derek Snyder, leader of Kin team, takes the stage.

There are actually two versions of the phone, and Kin 1 and Kin 2 are the two flavors we expected. One is a candybar with a qwerty keyboard; the other looks like a smaller, round device with a slide keyboard.

Snyder shows the “loop” interface. Sort of a unified inbox for all kinds of status messages.

10:17 am: Now showcasing “the Kin spot,” a region on the screen where “sharing happens.”

It appears this doesn’t automatically interact with social networks. He says, “You can even update statuses to social networks.” That seems to happen with other interfaces. Snyder again hits on the “three categories of friends.”

10:19 am: Snyder now is showing the “app-lications.”
Now he’s showing Bing search, which is GPS-aware.

He moves an event and a venue into a single-status update, then shares that group. Not sure what that looks like externally.

10:22 am: Now Snyder is talking music and about the experience of using this with Zune. He says the devices can stream music from Zunepass.

Now for the camera: 5- and 8-megapixel sensors on the phones, and the Kin 2 shoots HD video. Both phones have a flash, which he says is eight times brighter than any on-phone flash to date.

Also showing “Kin studio,” a Web interface that shows all your phone activity online.

Photos taken on the device are accessible there, as well as call history and status updates. It’s all viewable on a timeline.

Also, photos are all geotagged.

10:27 am: Bach returns to the stage. Sounds like he’s going to talk about partners.

10:27 am: Bach says that Sharp built the Kin hardware, and they will be on the Verizon and Vodaphone networks.

10:28 am: John Harrobin, SVP of digital media for Verizon, takes the stage.

He gives Verizon talking points about being largest, most reliable, etc., and now talks about how Kin will fit into people’s lives.

He takes the message in another direction, away from the youth market. Now, “Kin is also for parents or anyone who is all about photos and video.” says Harrobin. He also says that Verizon will be the exclusive partner for Kin. It will release the phones next month.

10:32 am: Bach returns yet again to say that “Kin is for generation upload.”

Looks like the event is wrapping up.

10:32 am: Lights up, music up, event over.

There are Kins around the room for the media to handle. We’ll head over there now and end the liveblog.

Microsoft Event Photos

Microsoft to Uncrate "Pink" Phones at April 12 Event

John Paczkowski — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 19:01:31 +0000

Apple isn’t the only company holding an invitation-only event this month–Microsoft is as well.

Four days after Apple (AAPL) unveils the details of its forthcoming iPhone OS 4, Microsoft (MSFT) will take the wraps off its long-rumored “Pink” feature phones at a San Francisco media gathering with the cryptic title, “It’s Time to Share.”

News.com’s Ina Fried reports that Microsoft will uncrate two Pink phones, code-named Pure and Turtle, at the event, both destined for Verizon’s (VZ) network. The Sharp-manufactured devices, which feature touchscreens and keyboards, are expected to go on sale this spring.

Microsoft and Verizon: Pretty in Pink

John Paczkowski — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 20:02:05 +0000

Looks like Microsoft’s long-rumored “Pink” phone project is about to make the jump from speculation to reality. Gizmodo has managed to get its hands on some marketing materials that appear to confirm Pink’s existence and finger Verizon (VZ) as a launch partner.

Evidently, there are to be two Pink phones–one with a horizontal slider, the other with a vertical one (click on image below to enlarge)–both manufactured by Sharp. Neither, it seems, will run Windows Phone 7, though Gizmodo suggests that whatever the phones do run might share some aesthetic elements with the operating system.

“It’s suggested that the (Pink) platform has apps of some sort,” writes Gizmodo’s John Herrman. “For a phone like this to share apps with Windows Phone 7 is pretty much impossible–the minimum hardware requirement for a Windows Phone look out of reach for this little black lump–so this one’s a big question mark. Is it another SDK? Or closed app development like we’ve seen on the Zune HD? Web apps?”

Interesting questions. Perhaps, Pink is Microsoft’s (MSFT) way of getting into the feature phone business without alienating its Windows Phone 7 hardware partners. According to Gizmodo, we may find out as soon as April when the devices are expected to arrive at market.

[Pink Phone Image credit: Gizmodo]

Sharp Expands Its TV Color Palette

Daisuke Wakabayashi — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 13:00:59 +0000

While televisions have transformed from bulky and boxy to slim and sleek over the last decade, one thing hasn’t changed. The basics of displaying color on TVs still derive from the same three fundamental building blocks: red, green and blue.

In what Sharp Corp. is calling a “revolutionary” breakthrough, the company says it has developed a way to add a fourth primary color, yellow, to the mix. By doing so, Sharp says its new flagship televisions–hitting the market in two months–will display more than a trillion colors, about 1,000 times more color than current models.

At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas earlier this month, Sharp introduced the product with banners that read “Hello Yellow!”–though a company spokeswoman said the signs weren’t a preview of its upcoming marketing campaign.

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LCD Makers' Increased Capacity May Stifle Recovery

Yun-Hee Kim — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 17:47:23 +0000

The rush by Asian liquid-crystal-display makers to ramp up production at home and to invest in new plants threatens to curtail the nascent recovery in the flat-panel market.

LCD makers in Asia have just started to see their earnings recover in the second quarter after prices began to rise thanks to production cuts made last year, component shortages and strong demand from China. But another supply glut could be looming as soon as the current quarter as companies such as Sharp Corp., Samsung Electronics Co., LG Display Co. and AU Optronics Corp. ramp up production from new lines.

“With the glass shortage diminishing in Taiwan, and [eighth-generation plants] ramping up in Korea, supply is growing faster than demand,” said Paul Semenza, senior vice president at U.S. market research firm DisplaySearch.

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