HP deepens push into cell phone market (AP)

The iPAQ 600 Series Business Navigator looks and functions like a cell phone and includes a navigation feature with 3-D maps. It’s HP’s second cell phone, coming on the heels of the Voice Messenger announced in February.

The company also announced the iPAQ 900 Series Business Messenger, a smart phone with a full keyboard that follows another full-keyboard model introduced last year.

Palo Alto-based HP unveiled the phones at a major launch in New York. Both run on the latest in third-generation, or 3G, high-speed networks. No carriers have been announced yet, but HP said the phones are planned to work with most major carriers.

The new phones are a key part of HP’s efforts to expand its iPAQ brand of handheld products beyond PDA devices, which still sell briskly, though their popularity is fading in favor of more phone-like gadgets.

HP, which supplanted Dell Inc. last year as the No. 1 seller of PCs worldwide, is better known for its PCs and extremely profitable printer ink than its handheld devices.

Still, HP is a major player in the PDA world, ranking second behind market-leader Palm Inc. in worldwide PDA sales for the first half of 2007, according to market research firm IDC. More than 22 percent of the 1.6 billion PDAs sold in that period were HP products, according to IDC.

But the rise of smart phones has pressured PDA makers. The success of gadgets like Research In Motion Ltd.’s BlackBerry and Palm’s Treo — and now Apple Inc.’s iPhone — is prodding handheld device makers to beef up their offerings in an increasingly Internet-connected world.

PDAs are increasingly seen as companions to cell phones and smart phones instead of the all-in-one device they were once were, said Gene Wang, vice president of marketing for HP’s handhelds unit.

“It’s less that the PDA business is going away, and more that, especially with the new 3G networks coming out, you can put so many new features and services to work,” Wang said. “It really brings the enterprise the productivity they’re looking for.”

When it comes to smart phones, HP is clearly still the newcomer. Less than one percent of the 53 million smart phones shipped during the first six months of the year were HP products, according to IDC.

Analysts said the company is facing an uphill battle as it fights entrenched competitors in the market of mobile devices sold to businesses.

But it also has deep pockets and tight relationships with customers who for years have relied on HP servers, PCs and services, analysts said.

“They’re facing some stiff, stiff competition, and they’re also walking a road where there’s a lot of charred wreckage,” said Crawford Del Prete, an IDC analyst. “But they’re also HP and they have a lot of resources to do this.”

The two phones were announced Wednesday as HP took the wraps off a slew of products from its Personal Systems Group, the division that brought in $29.2 billion in sales last year and includes consumer and business PCs, plasma and LCD flat-screen televisions and PDAs.

Starbucks to offer free iTunes access in stores (Reuters)

The service will debut at more than 600 Starbucks stores in New York and Seattle on October 2, the companies said, and will be expanded to other major U.S. cities later this year and next.

Through the deal, Starbucks hopes to boost both its coffee sales and its new music business, while Apple's iTunes seeks to sell more downloads. Terms were not disclosed.

Starbucks customers with either the new iPod touch just announced on Wednesday or an iPhone or a computer running iTunes will be able to navigate to the new iTunes Wi-Fi music store without paying a connection fee.

Currently, customers pay to use the Wi-Fi wireless Internet service provided by Deutsche Telekom AG's T-Mobile at Starbucks' U.S. stores.

While navigating the iTunes online store, customers will be able to see what song is playing in the Starbucks store at that moment and buy it with one click.

"We know a lot of people are going to be very happy with this new combination of coffee and iPods," Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs said. He said the two companies had been working on the deal for more than two years.

In an interview, Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz declined to discuss the deal except to say it is "mutually beneficial to both Apple and Starbucks."

Schultz said he expected the service to bring new customers to Starbucks — especially users of the newest iPods.

"It is highly relevant and very cool for young people to buy these new devices, and certainly we recognize that demographic and age profile is younger than our core customer," he said.

Seattle-based Starbucks, which already had been selling CDs in its stores, earlier this year launched its own label, Hear Music. It released the latest album by Paul McCartney in June and has also signed artists such as James Taylor and Joni Mitchell.

Starbucks shares fell 28 cents, or 1 percent, to close at $27.44 on Nasdaq, and Apple shares close down $7.40, or 5 percent, at $136.76.

(Reporting by Scott Hillis and Nichola Groom)

Apple puts Wi-Fi in iPod Touch (InfoWorld)

"Today we're here to talk about music," Jobs said.

"We've distributed 600 million copies of iTunes so far, and customers have bought and downloaded over 3 billion songs from iTunes. iTunes is the number one online music store in every single one of the 22 countries it operates in," he explained. "We started with just 200,000 songs, and we have over 6 million songs in every single one of those stores."

Jobs told the audience that the iTunes Store — now the No. 3 music retailer in the United States behind Wal-Mart and Best Buy — carries more than 550 television shows and has sold 95 million TV shows to date. The service features links to more than 125,000 podcasts, with more than 25,000 of them featuring video.

"This last stat I want to share with you blew my mind. In the U.S., of all the music releases in 2006, 32 percent were digital-only releases," said Jobs. "They were not released on a CD. Wow. Look how far we've come: A third of the music released in this country was not on a CD.

"So that gives you a feeling for how far we've coming in the last five years in the digital music revolution."

Jobs revealed that Apple plans to release a new version of iTunes on Wednesday evening that will support the products that are being announced Wednesday — and the biggest new feature in iTunes will be ring tone support for the iPhone.

"We're going to do ring tones in our own special way," explained Jobs.

"And, of course, these are for the iPhone. And what we want is rather than having someone make ring tones for us, we're going to make a custom ring tone maker. We're going to build it into iTunes, and you can make ring tones from many songs available on iTunes, including some songs you've already purchased."

Jobs compared iTunes ring tones to the competition, which cost up to $2.49. "Our ring tones, make 'em yourself, you pay another 99 cents to make the ring tone," he said.

Jobs demonstrated how the new feature works using Aretha Franklin's classic soul number "Respect." All of the songs on the iTunes Store that are "ringtonable" will feature a bell icon column in the music list. You click on the bell, the ring tone maker pops up, and you can click and drag to find the part of the song you want to use as a ring tone. iTunes creates a new file in the ring tone folder, and a new tab in Tunes then lets you decide what to sync to your iPhone.

Jobs played "Give Peace a Chance," then added, "That's [for] when NBC calls," referring to Apple's recent dispute with the TV network, which said it will end its partnership to publish shows on the iTunes Store in December.

iPodnews
Jobs said that Apple has sold 110 million iPods to date. "The place when the sales curve is strongest is the holiday season," said Jobs. "We're approaching the holiday 2007 season, and we want to get ready.

"Today we're going to refresh or replace every product in the lineup," said Jobs.

The iPod Suffle is being updated with "some really nice new colors," said Jobs. Apple is also adding a Product(red) Shuffle model, with proceeds going to help fight diseases in Africa.

"Now let's move on to something more substantial: the iPod Nano," said Jobs.

The iPod Nano is the most popular music player in history, said Jobs.

People love it, he added, but Apple wanted to make it better based on customer feedback. New features of the redesigned iPod Nano include the ability to watch video on a larger, brighter display. The new iPod Nano also features Cover Flow, the ability to scroll through album artwork visually. What's more, the new Nano also has games support, more storage features, and a full metal design.

The redesigned iPod Nano comes in five colors — red, black, silver, blue, and green. "It's incredibly tiny, it's incredibly thin," said Jobs.

The iPod Nano now includes a 2.0-inch display that features the same resolution as the previous-generation full-sized iPod: 320 x 240 pixels.

"We've achieved this with a screen with the highest pixel density we've ever shipped: 204 ppi," explained Jobs. "And the screen is just gorgeous. When you see it, you're going to really love it."

The user interface has been enhanced on the iPod Nano — the left side has the traditional iPod menu, and on the right, a preview of what you're selecting. Jobs also indicated that the new iPod Nano ships with three games; Vortex and Sudoku were both named specifically.

Jobs demonstrated the iPod Nano playing video by watching an episode of The Daily Show featuring John Hodgman, the actor who appears as the PC in Apple's "Mac and PC" television ads.

Jobs said the new iPod Nano provides 24 hours of audio and 5 hours of video playback on a single battery charge.

The redesigned iPod Nano comes in two versions: a 4GB version in silver, for $149, and 8GB version in colors, for $199.

"These new Nanos have left our factories already. They shipped Wednesday, they're on planes, they should be in stores by this weekend," said Jobs.

"'A little video for everyone' is our new line."

The "classic" iPod
"Now the iPod's got a funny name," mused Jobs. "It's just called 'the iPod' because it was the first one. We thought, 'It's time to give it a name.' We're going to call it the iPod Classic."

The new iPod still features a click wheel, and it's now a full metal design in silver and black. The low-end iPod classic (at 80GB) is now thinner than the 30GB thin model that preceded it. Jobs claims the new iPod gets 30 hours of audio playback and 5 hours of video playback on a single charge.

Like the iPod Nano, the new iPod Classic features an enhanced user interface.

Apple is also offering a model that features 160GB of storage.

"This boggles the mind," said Jobs for emphasis. "The first iPod put 1,000 songs in your pocket. This new iPod puts 40,000 songs in your pocket. It's amazing."

The new 80GB model costs $249, while the 160GB model costs $349, with availability beginning Wednesday.

The iPod Touch
"You know, when we , we said it was the best iPod ever. And iPhone owners agree with us. It's incredible, with its multitouch UI, its incredible album artwork and video, it is ," said Jobs. "And people have been wondering, when are we going to bring this tech to the iPod? The answer is, we're going to do it today, and this is what the product looks like."

 8mm thinner, according to Jobs, who said, "We think it's one of the Seven Wonders of the World."

The iPod Touch sports a 3.5-inch widescreen display, and along its bottom run music, video, and photo icons. "Just like the iPhone, this is the best way to share photos on a portable device ever," said Jobs proudly.

The iPod Touch's button-driven interface also showed icons for a calculator, contacts, clock, calendar, and settings icons. What's more, the new device has Wi-Fi — the iPod Touch is the first iPod to feature wireless networking capabilities, with support for 802.11b and 802.11g networks.

"Others have done this and have failed," said Jobs, referring to wireless networking — and perhaps making a casual swipe at . "We think we know why it's failed. What's the problem with adding Wi-Fi? Part is getting on Wi-Fi itself."

"When you're at home, you might need a password. When you're in the office, you might have a password," said Jobs. "But everywhere in between can be challenging. You go to any hotel, and to log in, they throw up a Web page.

"Portable devices don't know how to deal with Web pages. You go to an airport, you'll see a Web page. Even walking through Stanford University, to use their Wi-Fi, you have to log into a Web page." The solution, said Jobs, was to add Safari to the iPod Touch.

"So you can view all those Web pages, zoom in, log into any Wi-Fi network pretty much. But beside that, you get an incredible Web browser … the best Web browser on any mobile platform," said Jobs. YouTube is also supported.

The iPod Touch's battery lasts for 22 hours of audio playback and 5 hours of video playback per charge, according to Apple.

The iPod Touch is a worldwide product launch, said Jobs. It's the first touch product Apple has shipped outside the United States, and it's been localized into many languages.

The iPod Touch is coming in two configurations: 8GB and 16GB, for $299 and $399, respectively. Both models are expected to be available "in just a few weeks," according to Jobs, who said that Apple will ship them in September, "in plenty of time for the holiday season."

One more thing
"But there is one more thing, if you'll bear with us," said Jobs.

"You might have noticed that there's an empty spot on that dock of the new iPod Touch," said Jobs. "What could that possibly be for? Well, it's for a new app we've written called the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store."

"'Finally,' some of you are saying," said Jobs. "It's so cool. So let's take a look at what it is."

Opening the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store displays four buttons: Features, Top Tens, Search, and Downloads. You can pick Top 10 songs from all of iTunes or only from specific genres. If you see a song you like, you can preview it, and if you like it, you can tap it to buy it using a Buy Now button.

You'll download the song, and the next time you dock your iPod Touch to your computer, it will sync back to iTunes.

Jobs demonstrated the new software's capability by buying John Lennon's "Imagine." The song was visible in a playlist on the iPod Touch called "Downloads."

"Isn't this incredible?" asked Jobs.

The iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store is available internationally in every country where Apple operates an iTunes Store, said Jobs.

"And we're going to bring it to the iPhone," he added. Jobs said the new software will be delivered to iPhone users via an iPhone software update later this month.

Apple and Starbucks partnership
"There's even one more incredible part of this," said Jobs, who revealed that Apple has been working on this for two years. "I cannot tell you how much pleasure it gives me to announce we've got a great partnership with Starbucks today."

Jobs called Starbucks "an incredible phenomenon in our culture" and added that a lot of Apple employees are great customers. Apple wanted to combine iPods and their love of music with Starbucks' coffee and love of music.

"In the new iTunes Wi-Fi Store, when you get near a participating Starbucks, automatically a fifth button is going to pop up in the store with a Starbucks button," he said.

"You will know what songs they're playing in Starbucks, and you can buy it with one tap of your finger. And if you just missed it, you can look at the last 10 songs they've played. They're going to program some cool music for us in terms of their collections," Jobs said.

HP launches five iPaq models (InfoWorld)

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The 910 and 610 use the Microsoft Windows Mobile 6 Professional operating system.

Although the PDA market has been shrinking quarter over quarter for several years now, converged mobile devices (PDAs that include Wi-Fi and cellular) are seeing robust growth, according to Ramon Llamas, a senior analyst with IDC.

"These are mini computers and for some it is a necessary enterprise device," Llamas said.

Although pricing is not yet firm, the 5.15-ounce iPaq 910 will sell for about $599 and will include four separate radios, a quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE and tri-band UMTS cellular chip, Wi-Fi 802.11b/g, Bluetooth, and a GPS radio for navigation.

For business users, the 910 includes a full QWERTY keyboard, Windows Mobile applications, and the Enterprise Mobility Suite, which is a set of hosted management applications. It also includes software compatible with Cisco's unified communications protocols, CCX (Cisco Compatibility Extensions). The display is a 2.46-inch TFT screen.

The iPaq 610 is also a converged device. It features four radios, including the quad-band cellular found in the 910. The major difference between the two devices is the 2.8-inch rectangular display, more suited for Web browsing and GPS. But the 610 lacks the QWERTY keyboard of the 910.

The iPaq 310, dubbed the Travel Companion, is a trip planner and a PDA as opposed to an enterprise device. It features only two radios, GPS, and Bluetooth, and it runs on Windows CE 5.0. The 6.6-ounce device has a 4.3-inch display and 128MB of SDRAM. GPS software gives user turn-by-turn directions with spoken word as well as on-screen display. Price is expected to be between $399 and $449.

The HP iPaq 210 model is dubbed Enterprise Handheld and includes Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. It does not include a cellular radio or a GPS radio. Memory is 64MB, and it comes with Office Mobile, Outlook, IE Mobile, and Windows Media Player Mobile. The iPaqe 210 is priced around $400 and uses Windows Mobile 6 Classic as the OS.

Finally, the iPaq 110 is HP's least expensive device, priced at about $200. Dubbed the Classic handheld, the 110 includes Wi-Fi and Bluetooth with a smaller 3.5-inch screen. Included is the same 210 application software.

The iPaq 910 and 610 will keep HP in the hot converged device market game. However, holding the No. 2 market share spot in the dying handheld market — defined by IDC as traditional PDAs without connectivity — may be somewhat meaningless, especially given that Dell, the fourth-place market share leader, has dropped out.

Traditional handhelds are a shrinking market, Llamas said.

Startup software maker Netbooks takes on Intuit

By Jim Finkle Reuters - 1 hour 6 minutes ago

BOSTON (Reuters) - Privately held NetBooks started selling a line of computer programs designed to help run small businesses on Wednesday, taking on QuickBooks provider Intuit and NetSuite, which has filed to go public.

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Netbooks' software is accessed via Web browsers and hosted on servers maintained by the company, which is based in Rohnert Park, California.

It also said it raised $6.9 million (3.4 million pounds) in capital from CMEA Ventures, Integral Capital and other advisors.

NetBooks provides accounting software along with programs for managing sales and marketing, inventory, purchasing, shipping and manufacturing.

The company was founded by Ridgely Evers, who helped lead development of Intuit's QuickBooks accounting software.

NetBooks is one of dozens of companies developing software that is accessed via Web browsers, the biggest of which is Salesforce.com, which sells software for managing marketing activities.

Its most direct competitor may be NetSuite, which is majority owned by Oracle founder and billionaire Larry Ellison.

Germany's SAP, the world's biggest maker of software for managing businesses, is also working on a line of Web-based software for small and medium-sized companies. So far, SAP has not said much about the product, but it is scheduled to talk about it at a meeting later this month in New York.

Other rivals include Microsoft and Sage Group

Evers said his products are unique because they have the broadest functionality among Web-based products designed for "true small businesses." He defines that market as small companies that have no aspirations of growing much bigger.

NetBooks, which does aspire to grow into a much larger company, uses software from NetSuite, according to Evers.

He also runs a family business that sells gourmet foods, including olive oils, which uses software from NetBooks.

(Reporting by Jim Finkle)

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