The American Consumer Satisfaction Index (ASCI) released their latest findings yesterday, revealing consumer satisfaction scores for cellphone manufacturers and wireless carriers. So who were the top two victors in their respective field? The first may not surprise you one definitely will as Apple and Sprint take top honors. ASCI collects data from more than 70,000 customers from more than 225 companies in 47 industries and 10 economic factors. This is the first year … [read full article]
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You’ve seen the ads. What once was Carly in a pink dress, talking about her myTouch 4G that let her Facebook her face off and while making little “digs” at AT&T, has now become a biker chic badass whizzing by an iPhone biker with a wink and a hat tip. She’s now edgy, and has the leather to prove it.
But T-Mobile is getting punchier on its own. Even in its earnings call today, T-Mo’s CEO Phillip Hume said it himself, “the iPhone is slow, even on AT&T’s network.”
If you can’t join ‘em, might as well start punching, right?
But T-Mobile is choosing to throw some stones with its new pile of rubble, and the refocus may actually pay off. According to the call, the social media feedback on Carly’s new look has been great, but without more real-world action the increase in mindshare means nothing. That said, T-Mobile is adding more than 7,000 doors in the first half of next year, with remodeling of stores still underway.
The carrier is also making a push in the enterprise market. B2B activations are up 15.5 percent year-over-year as of Q1.
Most importantly, T-Mo is putting a huge effort into building out its 4G LTE network to be ready by 2013. Currently, the carrier only touts up to 42Mbps speeds on its faux-”4G” HSPA+ network, which isn’t legitimate 4G LTE by any means, but Hume made sure to point out that T-Mobile 3G is still faster than AT&T 3G.
In fact, the CEO pointed to a test done by PCWorld that claims that “T-Mobile’s HSPA+ 21 service won in the 3G bracket of [the] study, and the company’s high-end HSPA+ 42 service competed reasonably well with other providers’ 4G service.”
T-Mobile plans and prices are already lower and more flexible than most carriers, so if Pinky can stay afloat while building out more stores and a better network, this fight may get even more interesting as time goes on.
T-Mobile just dropped their second commercial on YouTube and this time they are taking a direct shot at the iPhone 4S on AT&T. More importantly, it’s Carly, a Motorcycle and a definite attack on AT&T’s iPhone network. How much faster is T-Mobile’s 4G network compared to the iPhone 4S on AT&T’s network? Don’t blink or you may miss it. Now see how much faster our 4G speeds are for real at [read full article]
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Well, this morning seems like it’s going to be all about sequels. Not only do we have a shiny new Droid Incredible to wait for, AT&T has just pulled back the curtains on a new device in their Focus series of Windows Phones: the LTE-friendly Focus 2, which will launch on May 20 for a mere $49.99 with a two-year contract.
The Focus 2 may lack the star power and the marketing muscle behind devices like the Lumia 900, but it has managed to turn a few heads in recent weeks back when it was still known as the Samsung Mandel.
Neither AT&T nor Samsung have disclosed some of the juicier technical details, but the Focus 2 sports a 4-inch Super AMOLED display running at the standard 800×480 as well a 5-megapixel rear camera and a VGA front-facer.
Early reports also pointed out that the device only comes with 8GB of internal memory, though whether or not that little detail has carried over into the final build is still frustratingly unclear. All of that fits nicely into a glossy white body (longtime readers may recall how fond I am of those) that comes in at just under 11mm thick.
AT&T aficionados may recall that the Samsung whipped up two Focus Windows Phones last year, the budget-friendly Focus Flash and the slightly-more-robust Focus S. I half-expected AT&T and Samsung to keep that trend going with yet another pair of differently-targeted Windows Phones, but this year AT&T already has those premium bases covered with devices like the Lumia 900 and the HTC Titan II.
AT&T has just announced a new security and home-automation system called Digital Life, which will be an IP-based platform that allows users to monitor and detect activity throughout their house remotely, and “take action” (as AT&T put it) on devices like PCs, tablets, and smartphones.
AT&T actually goes so far as to say “there are no capacity limits to the number and variety of devices [they] can connect to and integrate,” since it’s an all-digital system.
Functions include access to automation, energy and water controls, and security systems. AT&T will thus be introducing a new branch called the Digital Life group, which will work in “AT&T owned-and-operated 24/7 security monitoring centers.”
You’ll be able to “try before you buy” at an AT&T store or through other unspecified AT&T distribution channels, and no matter your current wireless provider, you’ll still be able to get in on the service. That is, of course, if you live in Dallas or Atlanta, where the first round of trials will begin.
Just a few weeks ago, we got a chance to check out the AT&T Research Labs, and it’s clear that AT&T has high hopes for pushing itself into every corner of your life. They already have a major share of the pie when it comes to wireless subscribers in the US, but then there’s AT&T U-Verse and now AT&T Digital Life.
In the labs, developers are already working on ways of registering who’s approaching a home through bio-acoustical transmission (the detection of vibrations in the bones through sensors in a phone or wrist watch) and having the home automation system decide whether or not to automatically unlock the door or announce a guest.
And AT&T wants access to your car, too. We saw prototypes for Got My Stuff, a system that scans the car for a list of pre-determined and RFID-tagged items to see if you’ve remembered them. The idea is that a customizable dashboard would be available via an app across multiple devices.
AT&T is already working on “the car of the future” in collaboration with Porsche, QNX, and Panasonic, so a push into the home right now only makes sense in preparation for a push into our automotive lives.
