Mobile World Congress
The Airtel-T9 India Consumer Vernacular Messaging Campaign has won the GSMA MWC award for the “Best Use of Mobile for Social and Economic Development”
The GSM Association expanded the scope of its massive Mobile Money Transfer program with strategic partnerships with Belgacom International Carrier Services and the Royal Bank of Scotland Group
HTC made waves when it launched its Android based phone ‘Magic’ with Vodafone. Magic features an Android-optimized Webkit browser, as well as Google applications, Google Maps and Google Search, YouTube, reports Tech Fragments.
Yahoo has boosted its services and shuffled them into a new ‘Yahoo Mobile‘ umbrella, which will be available by March 2009, according to the release. Yahoo Mobile has features segregated into Discover – consisting of OneSearch and Today; Connect with email, IM and social networking and Stay Informed with News and OnePlace, which lets consumers add their favorite news topics and sources, RSS feeds, weather conditions, sports scores, stock quotes, websites/blogs, horoscopes and movie theaters on their mobile.
Navteq now offers LBS developers an API and RSS feed data for weather through its network. Navteq announced a partnership with weather service firm Foreca to provide the API.
BizNews has a nice video on Youtube of a new gadget called Vuzix, video glasses demonstrated at the MWC. Another nifty gadget Bond-style is a watch by LG.
LG showcased the X120, a 3G supporting netbook that marks its foray into the netbook market.
i-mate‘s upcoming Windows Mobile Standard Smartphone, according to Unwired, is just the size of a credit card. SIM cards that detect motion were also demonstrated at MWC.
Palringo has partnered with Gigafone’s Ochre, to tackle market fragmentation in the digital media campaigning domain. The two firms will bring the four major components of the mobile advertising ecosystem – campaign creation, planning, distribution and result measurement – together, the release said.
DataViz launched an iPhone application called Documents To Go, which allows mobile users to modify Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint document from their handsets, reports MacNN.
MySpace has a new mobile version that steps up branding and advertisement opportunities. According to Mobile Crunch, MySpace Mobile has seen 2 million installations in the past week and has 20 million mobile users overall.
Nokia and Qualcomm will collaborate for UMTS mobile devices this year. The devices will be launched in mid-2010 and run on Symbian Foundation’s yet to be released platform, the release said.
GSMA and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Partner to Expand Availability of Financial Services through Mobile Phones
Nokia launched the 8 mega-pixel camera sporting N86 while Garmin and Asus tied up to bring location based ‘phoning’ with the Nuviphone.
Skype announced its VoIP client would come pre-loaded on Nokia N series smartphones.
Acer can be expected to launch two Android based devices this year, reports Android Community.
OgilvyOne, the global direct and digital unit of The Ogilvy Group, has joined forces with mobile advertising solution provider Mobixell. They will team up to deliver a complete commercial and technological package which includes: advertising, brand management, consumer profiling, campaign planning and execution, ad serving and rich media delivery, the release said.
SpinVox has launched a voice to text service for Italian and Portugese
