Indians can now afford 5G smartphones at just Rs 44 a day: Samsung India

by Hansraj Agrawal | Jan 25, 2023 | Technology

Samsung India on Tuesday said it now has more than 62 million Galaxy A series smartphone customers in India and people can now enjoy a true 5G experience at just Rs 44 a day, or Rs 1,320 a month, via attractive EMI options, as the country-wide 5G roll out gains momentum in 2023.

Aditya Babbar, Samsung India’s Senior Director of Mobile Business, told IANS that the early launch of new 5G smartphones is part of the company’s 5G-first strategy and will help the South Korean company secure 75 per cent of its smartphone business through 5G devices this year.

“We’ve come up with multiple affordability options for our consumers, including extremely low EMIs, starting as low as Rs 44 per day for newly-launched Galaxy A14 5G,” Babbar said.

Last year, Galaxy A series was India’s best-selling smartphone series.

“In fact, the Galaxy A is industry’s fastest-growth smartphone series (above 10 million units). We believe the launch of Galaxy A14 5G and A23 5G will help us start the year on a strong note,” Babbar added.

Samsung’s new Galaxy A series smartphones are made for the 5G era and come with a large 6.6-inch screen and a 5000mAh battery for seamless entertainment.

Samsung is betting big on its recently launched 5G smartphones – Galaxy A14 5G and A23 5G – to consolidate its 5G leadership in the country.

Galaxy A14 5G comes with Samsung’s new Galaxy signature design and is the company’s most affordable 5G smartphone in the A series portfolio in India, starting at an effective price of Rs 14,999.

Galaxy A23 5G, which comes with a 50MP camera with OIS, starts at an effective price of Rs 20,999.

According to Babbar, to democratise 5G technology in India, “we are not only reaching out to more customers by leveraging our distribution depth, but also providing more affordability options to customers”.

“We have ensured that A14 5G and A23 5G are the most widely distributed 5G smartphones in the country. We are also ensuring equal EMIs for our 4G and 5G phones,” Babbar told IANS.

Samsung said that 60 per cent of its customers use affordability platforms to buy smartphones, higher than the industry average of 40 per cent.

Nearly 80 per cent of Samsung customers who buy smartphones on credit use Samsung Finance+ platform, which the company launched in 2019.

Samsung led the India market in 5G smartphone shipments last year.

–IANS

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(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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Microsoft logs slowest quarter growth in 6 years, PC sales nosedive

by Hansraj Agrawal | Jan 25, 2023 | Technology

Microsoft has recorded its slowest sales growth in more than six years in its December quarter of 2022, as it took a $1.2 billion hit after laying off 10,000 people amid poor PC sales globally.

Revenue was $52.7 billion and increased 2 per cent while net income was $16.4 billion, decreased 12 per cent for the quarter that ended December 31.

Revenue in the ‘More Personal Computing’ was $14.2 billion and decreased 19 per cent. While Windows OEM revenue decreased 39 per cent, Xbox content and services revenue decreased 12 per cent and devices revenue decreased 39 per cent.

Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella said the next major wave of computing is being born, as the Microsoft Cloud turns the world’s most advanced AI models into a new computing platform.

“We are committed to helping our customers use our platforms and tools to do more with less today and innovate for the future in the new era of AI,” said Nadella.

Microsoft has made a “multiyear, multibillion dollar” investment in ChatGPT developer OpenAI.

Last week, the company said it will begin integrating ChatGPT into its Azure cloud services offerings.

“We are focused on operational excellence as we continue to invest to drive growth. Microsoft Cloud revenue was $27.1 billion, up 22 per cent year-over-year as our commercial offerings continue to drive value for our customers,” said Amy Hood, executive vice president and chief financial officer of Microsoft.

While LinkedIn revenue increased 10 per cent, Search and news advertising revenue excluding traffic acquisition costs increased 10 per cent in the quarter.

–IANS

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(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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Teams, Outlook down for thousands in India; Microsoft says probe underway

by Hansraj Agrawal | Jan 25, 2023 | Technology

Several services of Microsoft including Teams, Outlook and Azure were down for thousands of users in India on Wednesday, a report by Reuters said. The users were unable to access the website’s multiple services.

According to outage tracking website Downdetector.com, there were more than 3,900 incidents of people reporting issues with Microsoft Teams in India.

In response, Microsoft said that it was investigating an outage. According to the users, Microsoft Teams is showing the message, “There was a glitch, and we’re recovering…”

Microblogging website Twitter was flooded with hastags like #MicrosoftTeams and #Outlook amid the reports of outage.

Like other tech giants, Microsoft hosts all its services on its Azure cloud. According to reports, the Azure cloud seems to have been hit by an issue. It has led to several Microsoft services going offline. Also, GitHub social coding is down for several users across the world.

The company is yet to issue a statement on what caused this massive Microsoft outage.

According to latest media reports, the outage seems to be global.

Reuters said that Microsoft did not disclose the number of users affected by the disruption, but data from outage tracking website Downdetector showed more than 3,900 incidents in India and over 900 in Japan. Outage reports also spiked in Australia, Britain and the United Arab Emirates.

The Downdetector site tracks outages by collating status reports from sources including user-submitted errors on its platform.

During the outage, most users were unable to exchange messages, join calls or use any features of the Team application. Many users took to Twitter to share updates about the service disruption, with #MicrosoftTeams trending as a hashtag on the social media site.

Microsoft Teams, used by more than 280 million people globally, forms an integral part of daily operations for businesses and schools, which use the service to make calls, schedule meetings and organize their workflow.

(With agency inputs)

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Noise launches Buds Combat wireless gaming earbuds at Rs 1499: Details here

by Hansraj Agrawal | Jan 25, 2023 | Technology

Home-grown consumer technology brand Noise on Tuesday forayed into the gaming wireless audio accessories segment with the launch of Buds Combat. Priced at Rs 1,499, the wireless earbuds are available in stealth black, covert white and shadow grey colours on Noise’s official website and Flipkart.

“At Noise we are determined to cater to the diverse requirements of consumers. With the launch of our first gaming TWS, Noise Combat we are aiming to do just that. One of our many firsts, the new TWS is designed to complement a gaming setup, making it an ideal gaming companion,” said Amit Khatri, Co-Founder, Noise.

Noise Buds Combat: Specifications

The Noise Buds Combat is a pair of half in-ear wireless earbuds featuring 13mm audio drivers. It is IPX5 rated for sweat and water resistance. Supported by environmental noise cancellation (ENC), it is said to offer crystal-clear audio experience while gaming, making calls, virtual meets, and seamless communication. It comes with a USB Type-C port for charging. Noise says these earbuds can deliver 36 hours of playtime coupled with Quad Mic ENC.

The earbuds have Bluetooth 5.3 for wireless connectivity, offering wake and pair features. For voice calls, the earbuds pack quad-microphone setup. It is compatible with both Android and iOS devices and has support for Google Assistant and Siri voice assistant. These have touch buttons to control music, adjust volume, activate voice assistant and receive/reject calls. Besides, the earbuds also offer ultra-low latency up to 40ms.

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Google to discontinue spam backdoor for political campaign groups

by Hansraj Agrawal | Jan 25, 2023 | Technology

Google plans to discontinue a pilot programme that let some political campaign emails bypass spam filters in Gmail at the end of this month, the media reported.

In September last year, the tech giant launched the programme in response to Republican (a US political committee) accusations that its algorithms disproportionately flag conservative fundraising emails as spam, reports The Verge.

“We will keep investing in spam-filtering technologies that protect people from unwanted messages while still allowing senders to reach the inboxes of users who want to see those messages,” Jose Castaneda, a Google spokesperson, was quoted as saying.

With this programme, candidates, political party committees, and leadership political action committees are exempt from Google’s spam detection systems, said the report.

Meanwhile, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) and eight states have sued Google over its alleged monopoly over digital advertising technology products.

Filed in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, the complaint alleged that Google monopolises key digital advertising technologies, collectively referred to as the “ad tech stack”, that website publishers depend on to sell ads and that advertisers rely on to buy ads and reach potential customers.

Website publishers use ad tech tools to generate advertising revenue that supports the creation and maintenance of a vibrant open web, providing the public with unprecedented access to ideas, artistic expression, information, goods and services.

–IANS

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(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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Govt expects 5-7 countries to sign up for India’s tech stack by March

by Hansraj Agrawal | Jan 25, 2023 | Technology

The government expects five to seven countries to sign up for adopting India-developed technology platforms like UPI and Aadhaar by March for accelerating digitisation, according to Union minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar.

While speaking at India Stack Developer Conference, the minister said that the Prime Minister has decided to offer India technology platforms to countries to help them accelerate digitisation.

“I expect by February-March, about 5-7 countries around the world to sign up (for adopting platforms),” Chandrasekhar said.

The government plans to reach out to several countries to offer them technology stack (Aadhaar, UPI, Digi Locker, Co-Win, GeM, GSTN etc) as part of its responsibility as G20 Presidency and expects Indian startups and system integrators to gain from the exercise.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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