Samsung - page 36

Considering that just a few short years ago Apple was scoring dead last on Greenpeace’s report on green-friendly data centres, the company has made amazing strides in order to turn around its reputation.

In a new September report from Greenpeace, entitled “Green Gadgets: Designing the Future,” the global environmental organization says that Apple is doing more than any other manufacturer to reduce the damage it does to the environment. The report notes that Apple has kept its promise to eliminate use of hazardous materials including Polyvinylchloride (PVC) and Brominated flame retardants (BFRs) in its products.

The man tipped to take over Samsung as chairman was the only Samsung executive invited to attend Jobs’ 2011 memorial service.

46-year-old Lee Jae Yong is the son of current Samsung chairman Lee Kun-hee, who suffered a major heart attack in May this year.

While relatively little is known about Lee Jae Yong he is considered to be the executive responsible for helping build the relationship with Apple that sees Samsung supply components for Apple devices, dating back to the iPod.

Judge Lucy Koh has denied Apple’s second attempt at banning certain Samsung phones. After Apple won its second major patent infringement case against Samsung earlier this year, it requested that a permanent injunction be placed on nine Samsung devices in the U.S.

Just like when Apple was denied a sales ban after its 2011 landmark victory against Samsung, Koh has not granted the second request. This time around, the ruling signals that Apple and Samsung’s court disputes are indeed settling down.

Apple is still reliant on Samsung for many of the iPhone’s internal components, including the fabrication of its almighty A-series processors, but in an effort to secure more processor orders from Apple, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) is already ahead of schedule with production of the next-generation A9 processor.

Now that Samsung is pretty much the only Android handset manufacturer making any money, you’d think that Android’s fragmentation problem would start to get better, but the latest Android fragmentation report from OpenSignal reveals the madness of developing for multiple screen sizes, hardware specs, and various versions of Android, has only gotten worse over the last year.

Samsung is taking its wall hugger shaming marketing campaign to the airport this week, with new ads plastered over electrical outlets that draw in battery-drained iPhone users with the promise to quench their thirst for a little more power.

Touting the Ultra Power Saving Mode on the Galaxy S5, CNET reports that the ads will pop up at JFK International as well as O’Hare and Midway in Chicago, and they’ve included a subtle jab at Apple’s latest ad campaign.

The iPhone 6 seems to get nearer and nearer each week as Apple fanboys and other tech enthusiasts await an official reveal date with mounting anxiety, but the age of the iPhone 6 might finally be close at hand. A year’s worth of leaks, rumors, and theories regarding the iPhone 6 are finally about to be put to rest, thanks to sources who revealed this week exactly when we can expect Apple to reveal their next generation iPhone.

Watch today’s Cult of Mac news roundup for all the details on the rumored iPhone 6 keynote date, as well as iOS 8 beta 5 details, and even why one piece of technology has Kanye West filing lawsuits like his name’s Johnnie Cochran.

Of course, don’t forget to subscribe to Cult of Mac TV on YouTube and catch all our latest videos.

Apple fanboys with a sense of humor and few hundred bucks to spare can own a piece of the thermonuclear history between Apple and Samsung, by throwing down on an eBay auction by the guy who had the worst name for an Apple Store specialist ever.

Apple and Samsung have decided to drop all patent litigation in courts outside of the U.S. The decision ends cases that are open in Australia, Japan, South Korea, Germany, Netherlands, the U.K., France, and Italy.

Disputes over intellectual property related to the iPhone and Samsung phones will continue stateside, and neither party has agreed to a licensing arrangement of any kind.

Samsung vowed to end child labor in its supply chain once and for all with its new ‘zero tolerance’ policy on child labor, but after coming down hard on Dongguan Shinyang Electronics this summer for employing under age workers, the Android maker has decided to just enforce 30% of its policy.

There are really only two players in the smartphone race: Apple and Samsung. According to new data from Canadian investment firm Canaccord Genuity, Apple and Samsung command a whopping 108% of smartphone profits combined.

The above chart is for the second quarter of 2014. Apple’s cash cow has been the iPhone for years, and it’s easy to see why; no one comes close to raking in the same kind of profit off hardware.

It’s not easy being Samsung!

After missing sales targets, and being knocked off the top smartphone spot in China by low-end rival Xiaomi, the South Korean Lex Luthor to Apple’s Superman is also apparently being hit hard by Apple’s embrace of other component makers for its devices.

In a recent press conference, Samsung executives admitted how its role as third party chip manufacturer (something which makes up half of Samsung’s microprocessor business) is being negatively affected by Apple’s decision to work with other partners like TSMC.

Apple filed a motion with the U.S. Court of Appeals yesterday, dropping its cross-appeal of Judge Lucy Koh’s verdict in its lawsuit against Samsung, and officially ending Apple’s pursuit of a product ban for the rival company.

Why make fun of existing Apple products when you could throw dirt on ones that haven’t come out yet? That’s Samsung’s latest approach in its newest TV ad titled “Screen Envy.”

There’s a line in 1990’s The Godfather: Part III when Al Pacino’s Michael describes his inability to extract his family from a life of crime, saying: “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.”

Much the same could be said for Apple’s relationship with long-time chip supplier and bitter rival, Samsung. Having previously heard that Apple was handing the majority of the iPhone 6 chip orders to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC), a new report suggests that TMSMC is now likely to lose future orders (most likely for the next-next generation iPhone 6s) back to Samsung.

KGI Securities analyst Michael Liu claims that TSMC will be supplanted by Samsung in the production of 14-nanometre A-series smartphone chips for Apple and Qualcomm, beginning in the second half of 2015.

The iPhone 5s is the number one smartphone in 35 countries around the world, according to new research conducted by Counterpoint Technology Market Research.

Samsung’s Galaxy S5 came in second followed by the S4, Note 3 phablet, and iPhone 5c at fifth place. With larger 4.7 and 5.5-inch iPhones on the horizon, Counterpoint notes that Apple will have another hit on its hands if it goes after the larger-screen smartphone market.

Back in 2012, Sharp’s Kameyama Plant No. 1 switched from making larger TV panels to smaller screens for smartphones. Apple became a key partner, and now the plant is at 90% capacity making displays for the iPhone 6.

You’d think that such strong business would keep Sharp happy, but that isn’t stopping the Japanese company from wanting to distance itself from Apple. The main thing Apple seems to be concerned with is that Sharp could end up doing business with Samsung instead.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) has reportedly started shipping its first batch of iPhone and iPad microprocessors to Apple, according to sources familiar with the matter.

By making microprocessors for Apple, TSMC is taking over a role previously carried out by Samsung. Some skeptics had previously suggested that TSMC — which is the world’s biggest contract chipmaker in terms of revenue — wouldn’t be able to deliver the complex chips to Apple’s satisfaction.

Design questions aside, the true mystery about Apple’s long-rumored iWatch lies in exactly what types of health-related sensors the wearable might include. A recent report claims the iWatch will sport an astonishing 10 different sensors, including one for sweat.

While pedometers, accelerometers, thermometers and every other o-meter Jony Ive can get his hands on might all make sense for a smartwatch, we’re wondering what Apple could do with a sweat sensor? Other than verify that, yes, your sweat glands are pouring out more fluid per minute than Niagara Falls during your jog?

It turns out that adding sweat sensors would do more than differentiate the iWatch from smartwatches by LG, Motorola and Samsung right out of the gate. It could make the iWatch the most “personal” device you’ve ever shackled yourself to, with surprising applications that go far beyond fitness and health.

According to new research from market intelligence firm ABI Research, the iPhone was the world’s most popular smartphone in Q1 2014, leaving competitors in the dust as the top-selling handset globally.

Despite ripping off ideas, paying celebrities to endorse their products, and having a confusing matrix of dozens of smartphones on the market, Samsung was unable to capture the no. 1 spot from Cupertino — with Apple’s flagship iPhone 5s 16GB coming in at the premier position.

The iPhone 6 is poised to become the thinnest, lightest iPhone Apple’s ever made, but all that thinning might mean the iPhone still won’t be able to hold a charge for more than 10 hours.

Eight iterations of iPhones have been released and we’d love to see true all-day battery life added to the features list, but according to a report on the the iPhone 6’s battery, the thinification of the iPhone 6 means it will see minimal battery gains when it launches this fall.

The iPhone is far and away the most popular smartphone in the U.S., according to a new report by research firm ComScore. According to ComScore, 169 million cellphone users in the U.S. use smartphones — representing around 70 percent of all mobile users.

Of these, Apple can lay claim to 41.9 percent of users, while runner-up Samsung has captured 27.8 percent of the market. After Samsung, the numbers drop dramatically to 6.5 percent for LG, 6.3 percent for Motorola, and 5.1 percent for HTC.

It’s the iPhone’s battery life that gets attacked in Samsung’s newest TV ad for the Galaxy S5. With the tagline “don’t be a wall hugger,” the ad depicts iPhone owners in desperate need of a charge at the airport. We’ve all been there, sadly.

Galaxy S5 users walk about without a care in the world showing off the device’s powering saving mode (which basically makes it a dumb phone) and swappable battery. The ad itself is another attempt to make Samsung’s product look better than Apple’s by slinging mud, and it comes across just as petty as it did the last dozen times.

Apple’s first foray into wearables is expected to be revealed this October, but Apple’s not the only tech giant preparing a smartwatch for this fall: New rumors claim Microsoft has plans for its own wearable, only it won’t look anything like the big bulky bands we just saw at Google I/O.

We first got wind that Microsoft was readying its own iPhone-friendly smartwatch last month, but a report from Tom’s Hardware sheds new light on what the device will look like when it hits the market with an ungodly number of sensors.

Samsung wants to be one of the world’s top 10 places to work by 2020, but according to the latest third-party labor conditions report, working for the South Korean smartphone maker is still a horrible experience, especially if you’re one of its Chinese suppliers.

An audit of 100 of Samsung’s suppliers in China found issues like overtime, proper saftey gear and training are still prominent issues. You can read the full 69-page report on Samsung’s site, but here’s a quick rundown of the egregious conditions: