In a one-two punch, the Wall Street Journal reports HTC has initiated two major investments in mobile service companies.

Garnering most attention is the reported $40 million injection of funds in cloud gaming firm OnLive, which is designed to enable games to be streamed over the web to any number of devices – from PC to TV, tablet and mobile.
HTC will buy 5.33 million shares in the privately held OnLive at $7.50 a share.

The move is billed by the paper as an attempt by HTC to strengthen its hand in the mobile gaming business, with company spokesperson Maggie Cheng claiming the move will "strengthen its gaming capabilities and help HTC tap into increasing demand for games on smartphones".

Embedding the OnLive player in its Android hardware would be a major boost to the company. OnLive has previously demoed its services running on iPad, but as yet, there’s no commercial deployment other than a spectator mode app. 
Said investment has been closely following by the acquisition of UK-based Saffron Digital.
The firm specialises in delivering video on demand content to clients, with the likes of Vodafone, T-Mobile, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and Nokia partners.
Combined, said investments seem to point to HTC gaining a foothold in delivering media content via the cloud, though the firm itself is remaining tight-lipped about any notion of a co-ordinated strategy being behind the moves.

[Source Pocketgamer]

]

How exciting! iPlayer in the palm of your hands. You might never have to enter the living room again or book a time to watch the last episode of Eastenders or Secret Diary of a Call Girl.

Looking more tablet friendly than the last iPad version which was essentially a squished version of the big screen version the Beeb have promised these key features on Android and iPad:

• Watch live TV and listen to radio (not previously widely available on mobile devices)
• Access the BBC’s full catalogue of catch-up programmes; seven-days’ TV and radio on demand as well as series stacking (as you get on the web)
• A simple and intuitive design with high picture quality and personalised favourites (making the most of the touch-screen UI, and a popular feature on the website)

For those with Android don’t get too excited right away as it will only run on the Flash friendly 2.2 version, Froyo. Another reason for those without to rally the manufacturers, set up picket lines and burn brassieres to get your phone up to 2.2.

The Kyocera Echo is possibly the weirdest phone I have ever seen. And why do I say such things? Well the Kyocera Echo is a dual screen Smartphone. It is a weird concept but it is happening. Over in the States (Where else would such a device be born) Sprint has just announced this dual screen handset. Think of a Nintendo DS form factor that is a phone, that doesn’t have game cartridges and runs Android.

Now why would you need two screens? That was my first question when I saw the first pics go up on the internet but the manufacturer Kyocera is saying that the point of these two screens is for “Simultasking.” Not multitasking, “Simultasking.” Apparently you can use two different apps on each of the screens or you can use both screens for the same app which could be useful when using Maps or something similar.

The two 3.5″ capacitive screens seem the only outlandish thing on the handset. As the Echo has the now standard 1Ghz Snapdragon Processor, 720p video recording and 5 MP. There is no dual core processor, no 4G radio and no point in being in my opinion. Granted it is an industry first which was advertised by Sprint and two screens could be seen as innovative in some peoples eye’s but not in mine.

Well, even if this handset is appealing to you, you can’t have it because it is on the Sprint network which is CDMA and won’t be coming to the UK as far as we know. My honest reaction, thank god!

Posted by: Patrick

Having made a real hash of the Toshiba Folio, Tosh have are stepping up to plate again in true do or die fashion. Toshiba Tablet is the cunningly titled tablet from Toshiba. This Honeycomb experience will feature a 10.1″ capacitive multi-touch screen running at 1280×800,16:10, 720p. the innards boast Tegra 2 from Nvidia, two cameras (2mp front facing and 5mp rear,) Wi-fi, USB, mini-USB, HDMI, full-SD card support, and 3.5mm headphone jack.

One of the big differences here is the ability to change the battery. You might need a screwdriver but having that option will shoot this straight to the top of many folks lists out there. Nice one Toshiba.

You can check out all the details on the rich website www.thetoshibatablet.com.

Huawei’s made a good impression on the tablet market with the S7. What appeared to be lacklustre on paper turned out to be worth much more than the sum of it’s parts in reality. At the time it was mentioned that a capacitive version was on the drawing board and on Twitter today the unveiled, the Huawei Ideos S7 Slim.

Rest assure, if this is at Mobile World Congress, I’ll fine it and provide more info on it.

Vodafone UK customers will soon be able to pick up an exclusive white version of the Nexus S, as well as the original black handset.

Vodafone will be the first UK operator to sell the Nexus S, the first Smartphone to be powered by Gingerbread the latest version of the Google’s Android operating system. 

The device has not yet appeared on the Vodafone ‘coming soon’ page but should be soon. Watch this space.

Posted by: James

Nokia’s E7 has appeared on the Vodafone ‘coming soon’ page. The device was announced back in September but has been delayed due to various reasons. I first got hands on with the E7 last year and although Symbian may not be my OS of choice the device seemed very sturdy and a bit of a power horse with its slide out full QWERTY keyboard. You can see the video here.

We will of course let you know when the handset becomes available via Vodafone.

Posted by: James