Year 2015 in Review: How smartphone brands fared in India this year

This year (2015), the smartphone industry with unprecedented growth, especially in the emerging markets like China, India, Russia, and Brazil. As a part of our ‘Year 2015 in Review‘ series of stories, we wanted to summarise how various smartphone brands fared this year in India.

This includes not only well-established international brands like Apple, Samsung, LG, and HTC, but also Indian brands like Micromax, Intex, Lava, and Xolo. We also take a look at how new smartphone brands like OnePlus, Xiaomi, and YU have performed in the country.

The Winners

• Apple – The iPhone 6s and the iPhone 6s Plus are considered as one of the best smartphones in the high-end category. However, they were sold with very high price tags in India. On the brighter side of things, the company sold tonnes of previous generations of its smartphones such as the iPhone 5s and the iPhone 6 in India. It seems true that most consumers just want to buy an iPhone, no matter how old it is.
• ASUS – Remember the first smartphone in India with 4GB RAM? Well, ASUS successfully managed to make a mark in buyers’ minds by launching the Zenfone 2 with 4GB of RAM, especially by pricing it attractively. A lot of consumers who wanted to buy a mid-range smartphone had the Zenfone 2 in their shortlists.
• Lenovo – The Chinese PC maker went aggressive in India this year. The Lenovo K3 Note and the Lenovo A6000 were in the list of top five smartphones in India in terms of sales according to an annual report from MySmartPrice for 2015. The company is off to a good start in India and hopes that it can continue to do the same.
• LG – Looking at how most smartphone brands started offering non-removable batteries and non-expandable storage, LG decided to target consumers who want those features. It did well in the high-end category with the LG G4. It offered a microSD card slot, a removable battery, a great camera, and a dual-SIM card slot. LG definitely is doing a good job in the high-end smartphone category, but its efforts in the mid-range or entry-level price categories seem lacklustre though.
• YU – The Micromax-backed smartphone brand tied up with Cyanogen to offer optimised smartphones. The company launched four smartphones in India this year and whether or not their products are good, they at least managed to attract a lot of attention from consumers.
• Motorola – After the company’s entry in the Indian market with the Moto G, which was a game changer, Motorola has launched some really good devices like the Moto X Play and recently the Moto G Turbo Edition. Even though not spec-heavy, they actually perform quite well, have good build quality, ergonomics, cellular performance, and loudspeakers.
• OnePlus – After the immense success of OnePlus One, the company took forward its initiative of releasing ‘Flagship Killer’ smartphones with the OnePlus 2. Even though it added many new-age features like a USB Type-C port, a fingerprint sensor, and a much improved camera, there were some cut corners as well. However, when you look at the company’s OxygenOS, you can understand that it’s going in the right direction.
• Samsung – Remember how Samsung got bashed by consumers for releasing a high-end smartphone with badly done software and cheap-feeling exterior design? Well, Samsung completely changed its path with the Galaxy S6. Its new products beautiful, well-built, and the software has improved immensely. Even mid-range devices like the Galaxy J and the Galaxy On series offer good battery life and reliability. The definitely appears that it has set out on a correct path.
• Xiaomi – The Chinese smartphone brand kept its game strong in the entry-level and mid-range price category by launching well-specced devices like the Redmi 2 Prime and the Mi 4i. However, it needs to work on software and improve its after-sales support.

The Losers

• Gionee – The smartphone brand lost its sheen to brands like OnePlus, YU, Xiaomi, and Lenovo. Once known for offering value-for-money smartphones, Gionee has failed to entice a similar feeling among consumers this year. We feel that the company should focus more on improving the software quality on its devices and reduce the bloatware.
• HTC – The company continued its age old habit of releasing pathetic cameras in its smartphones this year. HTC needs to understand that it cannot succeed in the high-end market without offering a competing camera.
• Microsoft (formerly Nokia) – Too late to the smartphone party, Microsoft’s attempt at making Windows as the alternative to iOS and Android has failed terribly. Not only it released Windows 10 Mobile too late, its latest smartphones – the Lumia 950 and the Lumia 950 XL – offered below par design and build quality.
• Sony – Good on paper, but not so impressive in real life usage. That’s the story with Sony as always. The Sony Xperia Z5 and the Xperia Z5 Compact couldn’t compete with the likes of the Samsung Galaxy S6/S6 edge/Note 5, the LG G4 and the Apple iPhone 6s Plus even though it is the strongest in terms of on-paper specs.

The Dark Horses

• BlackBerry – Although it did not launch its first ever full-fledged Android smartphone in India yet, people are pretty excited about the Priv. The company managed to sell more units of BlackBerry Priv this quarter than it sold BBOS 10-powered devices in Q3 2015.
• Huawei – It is the biggest smartphone brand in China, and it made a Nexus smartphone this year to show the world that it can make a class-leading smartphone for the international audience. The Huawei Nexus 6P is considered to be one of the best smartphone this year. It also did a fairly decent job with the Honor brand in India as it released some interesting and well-performing devices.
• Intex – The company claimed that it became the second largest smartphone vendor in India after Samsung. The numbers were trashed by Micromax, but it seems that Intex has managed to sell a lot of smartphones in India with the help of aggressive marketing.

Everybody Else

Other brands like Lava, Meizu, Micromax, Oppo, Vivo, and Xolo failed to gather as much attention this year as they would have wanted. Micromax is still stuck with bad software and pathetic customer support. Oppo hasn’t understood the importance of pricing its devices correctly. Consumers couldn’t get used to Meizu’s software because it behaves different from Android that people are familiar with.

Xolo tried its hand at online-only ‘Black’ series of smartphones, but failed. None of its devices received the amount of hype that is associated with online-only products nor did they were awarded with favourable ratings from experts. The other smartphone brands that aren’t mentioned in this article definitely didn’t do anything interesting in India.

Samsung Pay Will Launch Online Payments In the U.S.

Samsung Pay plans a major expansion in the United States next year. Users will be able to make purchases on websites with Samsung Pay, which puts it into more direct competition with services like Paypal, Reuters reports. The mobile wallet platform will be also available on lower-end Samsung smartphones, not just flagship models like the Galaxy S6 Edge.

In an interview with Reuters, Samsung global co-general manager Thomas Ko said Samsung Pay will roll out to more smartphone models next year. The payment platform launched in the U.S. in September and has an advantage over competitors because it can emulate magnetic stripe cards thanks to Samsung’s acquisition of LoopPay, in addition to using NFC technology like Apple Pay and Android Pay.

This means Samsung Pay works with a wider assortment of existing point-of-sale equipment than Apple Pay or Android Pay does.

Ko claims that Samsung Pay is already the most widely accepted mobile payments system in the U.S. because it is compatible with most credit card terminals. Mobile wallets haven’t quite taken off in the U.S. yet, but getting people accustomed to using their stored financial information in Samsung Pay for online purchases may convince them to pull out their smartphones at cashier stands, too.

Xiaomi Mi 3, Mi 4 and Mi Note to Soon get Updated with Android 6.0 Marshmallow

Xiaomi will be soon releasing the Android 6.0 Marshmallow updates for a few of its devices including Xiaomi Mi 4, Mi Note and Mi 3. According to the MIUI operations manager, the update seems to be in the final stages of testing and will see the light soon.

This was an update that many were waiting for with bated breath and with this update Xiaomi will join a handful of other phone manufacturers who have already updated their phones with the Marshmallow. The update seems to have in fact reached the update validation stage which means that it might start seeding pronto.

Many Xiaomi users were dejected when the company still stuck to the age old Android KitKat 4.4 even after releasing the MIUI 7 ROM, but Xiaomi contradicted the apprehension saying that the base version of the OS wouldn’t matter as the features in MIUI 7 would be same. This is indeed a legit argument but it sort of loses its steam as some of the apps from the Playstore run only on the Android Lollipop and newer versions.

Now it seems that the phones will be directly updated to the Android Marshmallow. The update is currently in Beta stage, post which it will hit the developer version and finally it will shape up as a stable OTA update, the entire process will take some time. We still aren’t sure if the update is coming for international users as well, or just the Chinese users for now.

We would suggest the novice users to wait for the stable version as the Beta is susceptible to bugs and other malfunctions which might ultimately affect your phones functionality. On the other hand if you won’t mind getting your hands dirty and experiment along with the device, the beta update is for you. We shall be posting more details as and when they become. Stay tuned.

Apple iPhone 6s and 6s Plus Continue to get Price Cuts in India

In a rather unprecedented move, Apple has (unofficially) slashed the prices for the iPhone 6s and the 6s Plus by 16% since its launch in October. This move seems to be propelled by the fact that the iPhone 6s sales had plunged into a valley right after the festive season of Diwali.

The iPhone 6s 16GB now costs Rs 52,000- Rs 55,000 as opposed to the launch price of Rs 62,000 (Rs 49799 on Amazon at the time of writing). According to ET sources, the price cut seems to have been carried out across all the variants. The latest bout of price cut literally brings the iPhone 6s and the 6s Plus prices down by 16%. Apple had also slashed the price of its iPhone 5s recently bringing it to an all-time low of Rs 20,990 for the 16GB variant.

The iPhone 6s 64GB and iPhone 6s Plus 16GB will cost as less as Rs 61,000 (Rs 60k on Amazon), while the 64GB version of iPhone 6s Plus will start from Rs 69,000. Last month, there were reports of Apple offering discounts via buyback offers, again something which never happened with newly released iPhones.

Another reason for the price cut seems to be the large gulf of price gap between the iPhone 6 and the 6s, thus making the upgrades less attractive. This also seems to be the first time iPhone price has been slashed in the first two months of launch, something that inadvertently points at the initial pricing. Another report points out that Apple had initially imported 320,000 units of the iPhone 6s and the 6s Plus but the deficient demand seems to have hit the same and now the imports have slung to a lower 120,000 in November.

The reason price cuts come out as surprising is the way Apple usually manages its pricing strategy, they are among the few in the smartphone industry who stick by their initial prices. The series of price cuts across most of the iPhone models is a tell-tale sign that Apple wants to spike up the sales number even if it means a direct slash in the iPhone prices, this however will add up as a bonus for folks looking out to buy the iPhones this holiday season.

Samsung Galaxy S7 To Get Pressure Sensitive Screen, Faster Charging Port, Says WSJ

In the cut-throat battle for smartphone buyers in increasingly saturated global marketsit’s become a game of clones for device makers.

To wit: Samsung is set to take a leaf out of Apple’s playbook for the next iteration of its flagship Galaxy smartphone. According to the WSJ — quoting “people familiar with the matter” — the Galaxy S7 will have a pressure sensitive display when it launches next spring.

This follows Apple rolling out its own pressure sensitive 3D Touch tech on the iPhone 6S, its current flagship, this fall. The tech brings an additional interaction layer to the iPhone, allowing users to press down harder to preview and view content — i.e. without having to tap multiple times.

Apple’s new, more sensitive touchscreen tech didn’t emerge out of a vacuum; rather Cupertino tested a similar tech on its Apple Watch wearable first, although the smartphone incarnation of the technology is billed as more sophisticated (hence having a fancier moniker; 3D Touch vs Force Touch).

The 3D Touch advantage represents a pretty marginal hardware gap right now vs Android devices, with relatively few iOS apps having had chance to make especially interesting use of the tech. Even so Samsung clearly can’t rest on its laurels.

Indeed, we’ve seen the exact same hardware feature catch-up race played out when Apple added a fingerprint reader to the iPhone 5S, back in September 2013 — with Samsung going on to put a fingerprint scanner on its flagship device thefollowing spring.

Albeit, on the software side, Apple is frequently accused of appropriating features from Android and adding them years later to iOS. See: Game of clones.

The WSJ’s sources also reckon Samsung will be adding a new high-speed charging USB Type-C port to the forthcoming flagship line, set to be added to both the Samsung Galaxy S7 and the S7 Edge (aka Samsung’s curved screen variant). This port will apparently support delivering a full day’s charge in under 30 minutes — or even significantly less. So even faster than the current fast-charging feature offered by Samsung devices such as the S6.

If true that’s a pretty significant addition. Apple just launched a $99 battery case — a not-so-tacit admission that people struggle with smartphone battery life as it stands. The S7 offering a very fast charge could therefore be a very popular feature — and one which steals a march on current iPhone hardware.

The S7 is also set to include an improved camera optimized for low light photography and with hardware that is flush with the back of the phone, rather than a lens that bulges out, according to the WSJ’s sources. Camera tweaks are pretty much a given with smartphone flagships since they are most people’s daily shooter nowadays, and photo sharing continues to be massively popular.

Other possible additions for the S7 line include a retina scanner, and the return of an external memory card slot (in the S7, not the S7 Edge), according to the newspaper’s sources. Samsung ditched the micro SD card slot when it redesigned the flagships last year — a decision that earned it plenty of blowback from the Android community, as did its decision to ditch removable batteries. So again adding a faster charging feature may help throw those disgruntled folk a bone.

The S7 is slated to launch in the U.S. in mid March, with its unveiling, like last year, due around the Mobile World Congress tradeshow — at the end of February.

We’ve reached out to Samsung for comment and will update this article with any response. The company recently reshuffled the leader of its mobile division — the first significant management change since Lee Jae Yong assumed the vice chairmanship of Samsung Group from his father last year.

In recent times Samsung’s mobile business has struggled to compete with Apple at the high end while also being squeezed on profits by fierce competition at the lower end from the likes of China’s Xiaomi.

Apple Is Reportedly Developing Its Own, Energy-Efficient Screens For iPhone And iPad

Apple is reported to be working on its own display technology in a move that could lessen its dependence on third-party suppliers like Samsung and Sharp, and boost the battery life of its products.

Bloomberg reports that the U.S. company, which is unique for designing its own chipsfor its smartphones, is said to have opened its own secretive facility in Taiwan where it is working on screens for iPhones, iPads and other devices. (The company is advertisingfor positions at the plant.)

That could mean good news for customers who worry about the battery life of their devices. Screens tend to use a significant amount of power, but sources from the new Apple facility reportedly told Bloomberg that Apple is working to make its screens “thinner, lighter, brighter and more energy-efficient” — that means less battery strain. Indeed, those sources suggested that Apple is looking to switch to organic LEDs, which could massively save on power consumption.

You may have to wait a while for the benefits to be seen in your daily life and devices, but it appears that things are moving in the right direction at a quicker pace.

Google Self-Driving Car’s Chris Urmson On California DMV: “Same Old Status Quo”

Yesterday, the California DMV posted a draft of proposed regulations for self-driving vehicles. Obviously, Google was waiting to see what came down and now that they’ve had some time to look through it all, their head of the Self-Driving unit, Chris Urmson, has responded with a Medium post.

Since these regulations are in draft form, the long back and forth between companies and the DMV begins now. However, many were not impressed with what has been initially proposed. The key takeaway from these is that California would like a licensed driver behind the “wheel” at all times. Well, fully autonomous cars might not have wheels. Because people don’t want to drive.

California’s Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom said in a statement:

These latest draft regulations may prove too onerous, create road blocks to innovation, and may ultimately drive the development of this promising industry to other states.

Urmson’s tone similarly cuts to the chase:

In a perplexing move this week, however, California seemed to shrink back from its leadership: the CA DMV proposed a draft rule that would require a self-driving car to have a licensed driver at all times. This maintains the same old status quo and falls short on allowing this technology to reach its full potential, while excluding those who need to get around but cannot drive. While we’re disappointed by this, we will continue to work with the DMV as they seek feedback in the coming months, in the hope that we can recapture the original spirit of the bill.

Google has been pretty damn transparent when it comes to their self-driving project, even publishing monthly reports that talk about accidents that took place and learnings from the team.

Urmson’s closing is equally as strong, challenging California to be a leader in the US in this type of innovation.

California is a state with both world-class car culture and world-class innovation, and we can do better. Instead of putting a ceiling on the potential of self-driving cars, let’s have the courage to imagine what California would be like if we could live without the shackles of stressful commutes, wasted hours, and restricted mobility for those who want the independence that the automobile has always represented.

There’s no “winners” or “losers” here yet, but the conversation about self-driving cars isn’t starting off the way that Google and other companies have hoped. Consumers simply don’t know enough about the technology to weigh in yet, which is why Google is trying to, and overdoing it sometimes, explain the ins and outs the best they can. Its program in Austin is a shining example of that. They’re not simply testing the roads there, they’re testing the community. Talking to them about what they think.

If the people don’t want to drive their cars, then states are going to have to put in more work to understand why and how.

Apple Is Reportedly Developing Its Own, Energy-Efficient Screens For iPhone And iPad

Apple is reported to be working on its own display technology in a move that could lessen its dependence on third-party suppliers like Samsung and Sharp, and boost the battery life of its products.

Bloomberg reports that the U.S. company, which is unique for designing its own chipsfor its smartphones, is said to have opened its own secretive facility in Taiwan where it is working on screens for iPhones, iPads and other devices. (The company is advertisingfor positions at the plant.)

That could mean good news for customers who worry about the battery life of their devices. Screens tend to use a significant amount of power, but sources from the new Apple facility reportedly told Bloomberg that Apple is working to make its screens “thinner, lighter, brighter and more energy-efficient” — that means less battery strain. Indeed, those sources suggested that Apple is looking to switch to organic LEDs, which could massively save on power consumption.

You may have to wait a while for the benefits to be seen in your daily life and devices, but it appears that things are moving in the right direction at a quicker pace.

Apple names the best iOS apps of 2015

Apple on Wednesday announced its choices for the best iOS apps of 2015. Taking top honors was Periscope, an app Eddy Cue, Apple's senior vice president of Internet Software and Services, called "truly revolutionary."

hat Periscope was named app of the year for iPhone shouldn't be surprising; Meerkat may have hit the market first, but Periscope really captured the zeitgeist. It didn't hurt that Twitter acquired the small team behind the app before it even launched.

Other iPhone apps honored this year include photo editing app Enlight, stock-trading app Robinhood, the amazing productivity tool Workflow and health apps such as Lark and Fit Men Cook.

For the iPad, The Robot Factory by Tinybop was selected as iPad App of the Year. The Robot Factory is an app that lets kids build, test and collect robots. Other iPad app honorees includeHBO Now, Patterning: Drum Machine and LiquidText.

"I continue to be really impressed with the types of apps that are getting created," Cue told Mashable. "You think everything that's been created has been done and then people continue to innovate and push the envelope across all the apps."

For the editorial picks for Apple's best iOS apps of 2015, they ran the gamut. Some winners, like Periscope, originally had small teams and were acquired by bigger companies. Other apps, such as HBO Now, are truly the product of big companies, but they still managed to push the envelope in other ways. Cue cited HBO Now as one of his favorite apps of the year, just by the virtue of how much more HBO he now watches as a result.

And some apps — especially in the gaming categories — are successes that grew out of upstarts. Prune, which Apple names its Best iPad Game of the Year, is the product of one person. It's the type of game Cue loves: "Who'd think a game about trimming trees would be so beautiful and fun," Cue said. "But they've done an amazing job."

The most-downloaded apps of the year

In addition to the editorial picks, Apple also released its year-end charts of its most-downloaded apps and games of 2015. Most of the big players — Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, YouTube — are on this list, but so are some apps you might not expect.

Crossy Road is the most downloaded free iPad app and in the top 10 of the most-downloaded iPhone apps. From Aussie-developers Hipster Whale, Crossy Road is an updated take on Frogger.

We spoke with Hipster Whale cofounder Matt Hall, one of the founders of Hipster Whale, about Crossy Road and its success in 2015 — an app that has transcended just mobile andmoved to the Apple TV.

Originally, Crossy Road was a project that cofounders Matt Hall and Andy Sum worked on as a game to do between projects. But quickly into the development process, Hall said he knew something was different and that "this could be something really special."

"We assumed failure but planned for success," Hall said. At launch, Apple featured the game as one of its best new iPhone apps of the week. And while Hall can't say how much that early exposure ultimately helped the game (we think it's the sort of game that had a viral component regardless of how it was featured), he acknowledged that being featured was "enormously helpful" and helped give the game "legitimacy."

With more than 40 million downloads for Crossy Road on iOS alone, the game has legs.

The list: Top downloads

Top free iPhone apps:

1. Trivia Crack
2. Messenger
3. Dubsmash
4. Instagram
5. Snapchat
6. YouTube
7. Facebook
8. Uber
9. Crossy Road - Endless Arcade Hopper
10. Google Maps

Top paid iPhone apps:

1. Heads Up!
2. Minecraft: Pocket Edition
3. Trivia Crack (Ad Free)
4. Five Nights at Freddy's 2
5. Facetune
6. Geometry Dash
7. Five Nights at Freddy's
8. Afterlight
9. Plague Inc.
10. Goat Simulator

Top free iPad apps:

1. Crossy Road - Endless Arcade Hopper
2. Candy Crush Soda Saga
3. Messenger
4. Netflix
5. YouTube
6. The Calculator - Free
7. Microsoft Word
8. Trivia Crack
9. Skype for iPad
10. Pinterest

Top paid iPad apps:

1. Minecraft: Pocket Edition
2. Five Nights at Freddy's 2
3. Five Nights at Freddy's
4. Geometry Dash
5. Terraria
6. Goat Simulator
7. Heads Up!
8. Five Nights at Freddy's 3
9. Toca Kitchen 2
10. Monument Valley

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Surface Vs. iPad Battle Gets Competitive As Microsoft Outsells Apple

Thanks to its iPad family, Apple has been comfortably at number one in the ‘Top Brands’ chart for US tablet sales throughout 2015. At least it was until October, when Microsoft’s sales of the Surface devices spiked and pushed Cupertino’s slabs down to second place.

The research on sales figures comes from 1010data Ecom Insights Panel (via WinBeta) and suggests that Apple’s iPad was not the top-selling tablet brand online in October 2015. While it has been on top for the first nine months of the year in terms of online sales, Microsoft took over in month ten with a 45 percent share of online sales, compared to Apple’s 17 percent.

Apple is in the historically unusual role of playing the establishment figure, with Microsoft casting the Surface brand as the scrappy underdog.

Yes, Microsoft is coming from along way back, which means growth in percentage terms will always look far better than that of any incumbent player. October was also the month when the Surface Pro 4 and the Surface Book went on sale, generating more heat in the sales than previous months. But the Surface trend has generally been upwards, running close to Apple in August and September.

It remains to be seen if the new hardware release numbers are simply a spike from sales to the geekerati and will be exceeded by the expected Apple spike in November thanks to the iPad Pro, or whether the trend will continue. If the latter, Microsoft can look forward to reaching double-figures in the annualised market share on the strength of a strong calendar quarter to close out the year.

There are two things that do stand out to me. The first is that Microsoft is capturing the ‘underdog’ story arc very nicely. No matter that the Surface devices started with Windows 8, have been through multiple iterations, and are only now reaching maturity, the story that the public is taking in is one where Microsoft is back and not only challenging Apple but gathering strategic wins against Cupertino.

The Surface devices, because of their higher price points, are contributing to a much higher ‘average retail price’ of $844, compared to the iPad’s average of $392. Again, there are a number of mitigating circumstances, primarily the lack of ‘budget’ Surface devices and a Surface Mini with a seven-inch screen, but the story that Microsoft is delivering with the Surface is one of desirable hardware, luxury prices that are worth paying, and an exclusive (almost secret) club that you have the privilege of joining.

It’s as if Redmond has been studying the Apple playbook from the first decade of the twenty-first century. And that worked out rather nicely for Apple…

Another Popular App Leaves The Mac App Store

Apple has a Mac App Store problem. Popular vector-based design app Sketch is leaving the App Store in order to move back to a direct-selling model. The developer announced the move on its official blog this morning. This isn’t the first time developers are complaining about the state of the App Store on the Mac.

“The customer experience on the Mac App Store hasn’t evolved like its iOS counterpart,” Bohemian Coding wrote. In particular, the company cites three missing key features.

Even though the Mac App Store is much smaller than the iOS App Store, app review still takes a week once you submit your app to Apple. It would be fine if Mac developers didn’t have any alternative like on iOS, but they can also push updates on their website in no time.

There are some stricter guidelines on the Mac App Store as well. Apps need to be sandboxed for improved security. But it isn’t always possible for apps with low-level implementations. You won’t see the Dropbox app in the Mac App Store anytime soon for example.

And finally, you can’t release new major versions of your app with a smaller upgrade price for existing users. Developers have been asking for upgrade pricing for years.

For instance, Wil Shipley wrote a long post explaining why the Mac App Store needed paid upgrades in 2012. Three and a half years later, Shipley’s post still holds true.

These are all fixable problems. But Panic had to remove Coda from Mac App Store last year. Bare Bones Software doesn’t sell BBEdit in the Mac App Store anymore. And many developers don’t bother releasing their new OS X apps in the Mac App Store.

These aren’t insignificant apps. These are professional apps, and many power users rely on them every day. Fortunately, all these companies found a way to issue new license numbers for existing Mac App Store users. Nobody is getting left behind. But Apple should dedicate more resources toward the Mac App Store.

A couple of weeks ago, an issue affected Mac App Store customers for a short period of time. While Apple managed to catch it quickly, it shouldn’t have happened in the first place.

Let’s hope that Apple plans to improve the Mac App Store in the next major OS X release as I don’t see today’s trend ending any time soon. The Mac App Store remains a great idea — a great way to discover apps, a centralized update system and a simple way to manage your software licenses. It just needs a bit of work.

Samsung agrees to pay $548 million to Apple for patent infringement

It all began back in 2011. Apple sued Samsung for infringing the company’s patents for things like “multi-touch gestures” and “tap to zoom” capabilities. The next year, a court ruled in Apple’s favor. Apple requested $2.5 billion in damages, but the judge decided that Samsung should pay $1,049,343,540. After an arduous legal battle that has seen many chapters, Samsung has finally agreed to pay a little over half that.

The final figure of $548 million was reached back in May after some protracted courtroom haggling between Samsung and Apple. Now the two companies have released a joint court statement in which Samsung has agreed to pay this amount so long as Apple can provide them with an invoice by the end of the day.

However, the term “final figure” might be a little misleading. Samsung has made it clear that they are reserving the right to reclaim the payment by reimbursement in part or in full depending on the results of any future court rulings. Apple has responded to these claims by asserting that Samsung has no such right in a legal rendition of “no takesies-backsies.”

So it looks like this is something of a false-close on this case. Sure, Samsung is agreeing to pay, but they’re everything but giving up on this. The company is expected to pursue a US Supreme Court review of the patent infringement case, and many are contesting whether or not the patents sought by Apple should have ever been awarded in the first place. If the US Supreme Court agrees to hear the case, we might be looking at a retrial.

A PHONE WHICH YOU CAN WASH WITH SOAP AND WATER!

Good phones are getting cheap and cheap phones are getting good" 

This is probably one slogan in the smartphone industry you have heard of. Sony released waterproof phones, followed by others doing the same. Phone case manufacturers launched cases which can beat the heat and survive in water too.

But, above all, the phone we will talk about today, we will talk about a phone which you can actually give a nice scrub with soap and water.

Kyocera, which has done a line in toughphones for several years has now launched this soap-proof phone. Launching is slightly soap theme, the phone will be available in pink, white and blue options in Japan, don't let the kawaii design fool you -- the phone is pretty designed to take some damage. And ofcourse, a shower. 

According to Kyocera, the smartphone use is now so frequent that many users are looking for a phone that they can use, and like almost anything else, clean it later on. To that end, the DIGNO rafre has a longlife, extra-hardy waterproof coating. This handsoap-washable water resistance also includes protection from warm water, which you'd probably be using alongside the soap. 
If this much information about its soap and water capabilities is not enough for you, it is also rated for hot water resistance at 43-degrees Celsius, which is not included in the usual smartphone IP certification ratings. The smartphone is IP58-rated and features a self-healing rear panel, which we have already seen in LG G Flex smartphones. 
Oh, forgot about this, the device is also shockproof (MIL-STD-810G). The display can be operated even with wet hands and is protected by Dragontrail X glass coating.

Talking about the specifications, which seem to be pretty impressive the Rafre runs on Android 5.1 Lollipop out-of-the-box and features a 5-inch LCD display with HD (720x1280 pixels) resolution. Under-the-hood it packs 2GB RAM as well. The processor details have not been mentioned yet. The smartphone includes a microSD card slot upto 128GB for expanding the 16GB inbuilt storage.

The DIGNO Rafre has a 13 megapixel rear facing camera along with a 3000mAh battery which is supposed to deliver 20 hours of voLTE talktime. 
The handset measures 71x141x10.1mm and weighs 155 grams. Full specification list should be out when the mobile is up for sale in the market.

Lastly, after all the specs and features we would obviously want to know about its pricing. The Kyocera Digno Rafre will launch on 11th of December and costs about JPY 57,420 in Japan ( Roughly Rs 32,300 or USD 485 ) 

Would you want to buy this shockproof, soap and water proof phone? Do tell us about in the comments!