Nokia holds commanding overall market share lead in India, Samsung the challenger

Next to China, India is one of the rising jewels in the mobile communication sector not only because of its large population, though that is a driver, but because the market penetration is markedly lower than China.

In 2012, 221 million handsets were sold in India, with growth fueled by the smartphone development, representing a 20% growth rate overall.

Smartphones are still a small portion of the market however, just about 7%, but that category saw growth of over 35% last year alone. Feature phones still own the market and continue to grow as well, with sales up 20%.

Who is selling all these phones? Most of them are Nokias. With 21.8% market share overall, Nokia sits on top with Samsung a distant second at 13.7%. When broken down by category, Nokia owns the feature phone segment at roughly 22% versus Samsung at 11%.

The tables turn in the smartphone category though, Samsung leads by a whopping 43% market share compared to Nokia’s 13.3%. Sony holds third at 8%. Nokia’s strategy to keep its affordable feature line is helping to keep the lights on for sure. While Nokia’s success with Windows Phone on the Lumia line-up can be debated one way or the other, there is no doubt that the efforts are planting the seed. What will ultimately grow from that remains to be seen.

HTC imaging head explains why the One has a 4-megapixel camera

HTC’s UltraPixel camera with Zoe is in fact a 4-megapixel one, a bold move that HTC risked to take as most of its competitors came up with 13-megapixel cameras on their 2013 flagships. But there is more than just the bigger single pixel size that drove this decision.

A Computer World interview with Symon Whitehorn, ex-Kodak executive who is now in charge of HTC smartphone imaging, revealed all the reasons why HTC went with a 4-megapixel camera. First and foremost it is about great low-light performance, but also about being realistic with what people do with image from their smartphones. Those are not professional photographs for large prints after all.

“It's really about finding the balance. It came down to how many megapixels we could fit in a sensor that size that can respond and give a significant difference in low-light performance. ... In 90 percent of the cases, four megapixels is more than enough.That also gives us a super manageable file size, which lets us do lots of cool things with Zoe. We couldn't do the dual-path encoding we're doing now, shooting video and stills at the same time, with a very large file size. If it was a 14 megapixel sensor, you'd end up just choking the whole system.”
The HTC One is capable of recording 1080p full HD video and capturing full-resolution still at the same time. But it’s also about the experience in the gallery where the system automatically creates a video of all the photographs and videos you take throughout a day, mashing it all up together with effects and music so it’s just there without you having to do anything. Good news is HTC plans to continue refining that experience:

“And we'll be evolving the whole Zoe and Highlight Video experience a lot more to give you more control. You're never going to give up that automatic, super elegant, we've-already-made-a-video-for-you-on-the-fly experience, but we're going to refine editing tools and make the whole thing even more elegant than it is now.”

The Facebook-centered HTC First press photo leaks out

Two days before its likely announcement, an alleged photo of the Facebook-centric HTC First leaked out. The smartphone will all but certainly make an appearance this coming Thursday, on April 4 during a press event hosted by the social networking giant.

The leaked press photo reveals the front of the upcoming device and a three-button configuration below its display. Curiously, there are no logos whatsoever present on the device's front.
The rumored specs of the HTC First include a dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Plus CPU, a gig of RAM, 4.3" 720p display, and a 5MP camera. The OS is expected to be Android 4.1.2 with HTC Sense 4.5 and, of course, deep Facebook integration.

Alleged photo of a Nokia Lumia 950 prototype pops up

An alleged photo of Nokia Lumia 950 prototype has emerged, thus pointing at what could be the Finnish company's upcoming flagship. Accompanying the photo were some rumored details on the upcoming device, whose name subtly harks back at the good old days of Nokia N95.

The Nokia Lumia 950 is reportedly going to feature an AMOLED display with a resolution of 1280x768 pixels. The display is reportedly sporting similar PureMotion HD tech as the one found in the Nokia Lumia 920.
The Nokia Lumia 950's camera is tipped to pack a larger sensor than its competitors'. Xenon flash, lossless zoom, oversampling, video stabilization, and superb low-light performance are among the camera's rumored features.

Nokia lumia 720 unboxing

Chinese HTC One 802w has microSD card slot, two SIMs

A Sina Weibo user with early access to the HTC One version tailored for China Unicom has pictured the One 802w smartphone. The picture reveals a removable back cover, two SIM slots (WCDMA) and a microSD card slot just under the 4 MP camera lens.

Taking a peak under the HTC One 802w back cover
The HTC One will globally be available with either 32 GB or 64 GB of storage built-in but without the expandable option, which has caused quite a lot of controversy.
There's no word if the 802t (China Mobile) and 802d (China Telecom) versions of the HTC One will also come with expandable storage and two SIMs but the 2 at the end of the product number can be indicative of the dual-SIM abilities. The European version's model number is 801n.