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By Sheila McGee-Smith
CEO Don Brown made it clear in a recent call with financial analysts that PureCloud is not just a multitenant replacement for the company’s traditional product.

After a few tough quarters, a solid beat.

By Eric Krapf
Service providers, middleware, and some of those "email killers" made the cut.

Last year, more than 1 billion Android smartphones were shipped. It's a massive milestone, and one that Apple, with its focus on the higher-end market, can't hope to replicate for years.

But according to a report by ABI Research, Android sales also went into decline in Q4 2014, for the first time ever.

Apple is demolishing the high-end smartphone market with the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. Samsung's profits have cratered as a result. New data shows that the South Korean company's woes aren't an isolated: Apple is now taking an astonishing 93% of all profits in the smartphone industry, despite its minority market share.

The iPhone is also outselling Android handsets in the US for the first time in years, according to data from Kantar Worldpanel.

And Google's Android is also under unprecedented threat from "forks" — independently developed versions of the OS that the company has no control over. The market share of forks is rising, and Cyanogen — a popular fork — just raised $70 million at a valuation in the hundreds of millions. "We're going to take Android away from Google," CEO Kirt McMaster told the Wall Street Journal.

But the most significant figure comes from ABI, which we read about in a blog post by former Guardian technology editor Charles Arthur.

It's the fact that — astonishingly — the number of Android sales dropped in the last period of 2014.

This isn't a decline in market share. It's a drop, in real terms, in the number of handsets running the Android OS shipped quarter-on-quarter in Q4 2014, according to ABI.

205.56 million were shipped in Q4, down from 217.49 million in Q3.

Here's the data:

This probably isn't the start of a long-term decline. As Android devices grow ever-cheaper compared to Apple handsets, it's likely to cement their position as the smartphone of choice for low-income consumers as the next billion people come online. But nonetheless it's astonishing that despite the huge potential markets emerging in the developing world, Android is seeing negative growth.

And forked Android vendor Xiaomi is going from strength to strength, further threatening Google at the low-end of the market. ABI Research Senior Practice Director Nick Spencer says it's "worrying times for Google's mobile services and Android, but it presents opportunity for other service providers and even operating systems."

Add all these factors together, and things aren't nearly as good for Google as that 1 billion shipment headline figure suggests.

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NOW WATCH: A 13-Year-Old Made A Revolutionary Invention Out Of Legos And Now Intel Is Investing In His Company

Box's Enterprise Key Management solution is currently in patent-pending mode.

By Michelle Burbick
As more offices adopt open design, new audio technology like recent releases from Plantronics could provide a way to ward off distractions.

VMware recently announced the integration of vCloud Air with Google Cloud Platform (GCP). Services to be integrated include: Google Cloud Storage (object), Google BigQuery (analytics), Google Cloud Datastore (NoSQL), and Google…

In a somewhat unexpected move to educate customers about a new technology, American Express has launched a vintage-themed, star-studded ad to promote its partnership with Apple Pay, AdAge reports.

The spot (watch it below) rolls back the years on some of American Express’ classic ads, featuring celebrities such as John Cleese, Jerry Seinfeld, Tina Fey, and Jackie Chan, among others.

AdAge explains that the ad, created by Ogilvy, aims to explain that while the technology people use pay with has dramatically changed, American Express’ safety and security remains timeless.

Allison Silver, American Express vice president of marketing, told AdAge that Apple Pay is a “priority message” for the brand this year and will continue to be featured in forthcoming marketing.

Other Apple Pay partners including MasterCard, Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, and Capital One have already launched ads featuring the contactless payment technology over the past couple of months.

BI Intelligence estimates Apple Pay will have 70 million cards registered by the end of 2015, no doubt helped by partner marketing campaigns such as these.

Here’s the American Express ad:

SEE ALSO: MasterCard (And Gwen Stefani) Will Reward You For Using Apple Pay

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NOW WATCH: Watch how many people can't walk on the street without having their phones in their hands

Samsung's new SmartTV has a cool new voice-command feature, through which the internet-connected device could record everything you say and transmit it to a third party, The Daily Beast writes.

The company's voice-recognition software allows viewers to communicate with their television by talking to it. It is enabled when a microphone symbol appears. Basically, instead of using a traditional remote control to change the channel, people can simply ask their Samsung TV to change it for them by uttering a few words.

This is worrying people, largely because of a warning hidden deep inside its "privacy policy." The Daily Beast first spotted this sentence, which reads:

Please be aware that if your spoken words include personal or other sensitive information, that information will be among the data captured and transmitted to a third party.

The Daily Beast makes the point that if peoples' living room conversations are being recorded and passed on, privacy is being undermined. Homes are supposed to be places in which families and friends can talk about anything and everything.

"Don't talk about tax evasion, drug use," the Daily Beast warns.

Sensitive information, such as "device identifiers," could potentially be passed to law enforcement, advertisers, and other groups, according to Samsung. "If the transmission is not encrypted, a SmartHacker could conceivably turn your TV into an eavesdropping device," the website adds.

It is important to note that the function operates in this way only when the voice recognition is turned on. But that feature is probably one of the main draws to the new technology. 

Samsung has responded to the privacy concerns in a statement to The Daily Beast:

Samsung takes consumer privacy very seriously. In all of our Smart TVs we employ industry-standard security safeguards and practises, including data encryption, to secure consumers' personal information and prevent unauthorised collection or use. Voice recognition, which allows the user to control the TV using voice commands, is a Samsung Smart TV feature, which can be activated or deactivated by the user. The TV owner can also disconnect the TV from the Wi-Fi network.

Similar concerns were also raised about Siri in the US. The service also transmits information to a third party. This blog first pointed out the voice-recognition function when it arrived on the iPhone 4S.

On the blog, Simon Fodden says he spoke to someone at Apple who told him "the Siri dictation feature is sent to servers that reside in the US and that Apple, its related companies and agents have access to the contents of what is dictated."

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NOW WATCH: A 13-Year-Old Made A Revolutionary Invention Out Of Legos And Now Intel Is Investing In His Company

Marriott has long been an IBM customer and today the two announced a deal that will move 80% of Marriott's old-school technology to what's known as a "hybrid" cloud built by IBM.

That means Marriott will keep its data centers but will update them to use the latest cloud technology. And it will also use IBM's cloud to host apps that it doesn't want to host itself.

IBM didn't announce the deal size, but sources said that it was along the lines of some of IBM's other bigger deals. Marriott's infrastructure supports over 4,000 locations worldwide.

This deal sounds roughly equivalent to the $500 million six-year deal IBM signed a year ago with insurance giant The Hartford.

IBM is also announcing contracts with Opera Software of Norway, Kallo Inc. of Canada. and Sohonet of the U.K., but we understand that among these new agreements, the Marriott deal is the biggest of them all.

IBM has been going through a major transformation as revenues have been shrinking across the board from its traditional hardware/software/services business, as enterprises have been moving to cloud computing. The company is laying off workers, while trying to beef up new areas, like cloud.

To that end, it has been broadcasting much news on its cloud customer wins lately, particularly in this area of "hybrid computing" which allows IBM to sell traditional computer hardware and services as well as cloud services.

Last month, it announced agreements with eBay Enterprise (deal size not disclosed) and a five-year $500 million deal with Anthem Health.

SEE ALSO: 26 enterprise startups to bet your career on in 2015

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NOW WATCH: What Happened When A Bunch Of Young Boys Were Told To Hit A Girl

Studio executive's personal emails were distributed by Sony's hackers, causing embarrassment.

Anthem, the nation's second largest insurance provider, was hit by hackers who stole lots of customer data including names, birth dates, medical IDs, social security numbers, snail-mail and e-mail addresses, and employment information --…

Who saw this coming? A year ago, the smart money said the cable industry would call the shots as the FCC moved to rewrite rules for the internet. But this week the agency chairman threw sand…

By Andrew W. Davis
Join us at Enterprise Connect Orlando for an update on what's happening with video everywhere from the cloud to the huddle room.

OnePlus is a tiny China-based startup you've probably never heard of.

It makes a phone called the OnePlus One, which happens to be one of the best smartphones in the world. (But good luck buying it. Stock is very limited.)

Even though it's such a young company, OnePlus made the rare decision to disclose a lot about its business in a 2014 annual report.

OnePlus is still tiny, but growing nicely. OnePlus also reminds us of another Chinese startup called Xiaomi, which also makes really nice phones and is now valued at over $40 billion after being in business for just over four years.

Here are some stats from OnePlus' 2014:

OnePlus One's phone is cheap. It only costs about $300. It makes a bunch of accessories too.

It's also really popular on social media. People are thirsty for invitations to buy the OnePlus One.

The company only has 88 global employees! That's tiny. But it only had six employees at the end of 2013.

SEE ALSO: Samsung is about to have its most important smartphone launch ever

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By Eric Krapf
This could be the decade that Google and its Cloud/Web-centric vision makes its play as the enterprise communications platform.

Amazon is reportedly interested in buying some RadioShack stores, Bloomberg reported Tuesday morning.

Although Amazon has built pop-up shops and Kindle vending machines in the past, the company has never had a physical retail store presence before (rumored plans for a flagship store in Manhattan never came to fruition).

So, why would the digital marketplace want to buy a bunch of physical stores?

Robert Peck, analyst at SunTrust, has some pretty convincing arguments for why it actually would make a lot of sense for Amazon.

Via Peck, here's why Amazon should consider buying some of the bankrupt RadioShack locations:

1. No tax law issues

"Amazon originally avoided local presence due to tax laws, which have now shifted and don't provide a barrier any longer." 

2. Amazon is already focused on local

"Clearly Amazon is moving more into local commerce with the rollout of its Amazon Fresh grocery delivery services — so it's focused on the opportunity"

3. Showcase Amazon products and services (launch new services)

"Amazon could use the footprint of these smaller stores to show case their new products and services. Displays of Kindles and Fire phones, would let consumers come in and try the technology to see if they liked it. Amazon could also demonstrate the wide variety of services it offers over Prime, like video streaming and music. We think mainstream consumers are probably unaware of the extent of the offering. Further, the sales staff could help educate and explain products. ) It's hard to remember, but the first Apple stores were much in that same vein (recall learning how to swipe, zoom, and pinch). In addition, for whatever long term ambition Amazon has around Payments, this could be a base for Amazon to build off of and a chance to convert consumers on a local level to start using Payments. Lastly, Amazon has also commented in the past about attaching services to sales of goods (consider the installation business for electronics or appliances). A local presence could also educate on the availability of these services to consumers." 

4. Improve pickup and distribution

"However, we think the biggest reason for Amazon to consider this strategy would be to improve local distribution and efficiency. RadioShack stores could provide, not only a place for consumers to come in to pick up purchases or items that are "in stock" but also a distribution area for Amazon╆s couriers to store and pickup merchandise. Interestingly, this could be the main point of Amazon╆s drone initiatives. Instead of having Drones delivering directly to consumers only, perhaps they could be used to move small merchandise between these smaller stores in a city, augmenting the availability of "local pickup and in stock merchandise" or even allow for more scheduled deliveries."

5. Broader ecosystem lift.

"While the prior items focus on the lift to Amazon products and services, perhaps one of the greater lifts to Amazon may be to its 3rd party sellers, who would be incentivized to give more of their inventory to Amazon so it can be available "locally." This would: increase the velocity of sales for sellers, augment the consumer experience (they wouldn't have to wait for shipping) and provide more power to the overall Amazon platform. In addition, a lift to 3rd party sales could be beneficial to margins."

SEE ALSO: REPORT: Google plans to compete with Uber with its own on-demand car service

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Some of the most popular apps on your smartphone ask for permissions that expose data to outside sources. Silent Circle asked people on the street to read some of these permissions out loud so we could capture their reactions.

Learn more about taking control of your privacy HERE.

Video courtesy of Silent Circle

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Last year around this time I posted an article on UCStrategies “Why 2014 Is the “Perfect Storm” For UCC Adoption.” I believe that in this past year UC has been recognized as that next step progression and now drive Unified Communications to the next level. In 2015 we will move well beyond the “hype cycle” for UC and, in my opinion, UC will go mainstream.

Because assembling Ikea furniture is so much fun (sarcasm), a new video game called "Home Improvisation" is letting you live that experience virtually.

They're calling it "the world's most fun and cooperative furniture assembly experience."

The game's furniture is assembled by clicking, dragging and rotating the pieces until they fit into their specific holes. Up to three friends can virtually join you in assembling the flat packs, or you can "labor alone and slowly descend into madness."

The game was created at this year's Global Game Jam competition in just 48 hours by a small developer team called The Stork Burnt Down.

It's available now for free on Mac and PC. Check out the full demo the video below.

SEE ALSO: The 20 Most Expensive Zip Codes In Silicon Valley

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By some estimates, Dish Network’s mobile spectrum is worth perhaps $20 billion.

The huge unanswered question is "what happens next," where it comes to Dish Network and its mobile strategy. Some skeptics have been willing to believe, all along, that Dish Network ultimately would simply try to monetize its spectrum assets by selling them or leasing them to another existing mobile service provider.

The success of that strategy hinges on whether one of the leading providers is willing to pay what Dish Network wants, in terms of price. Most observers looking at that scenario would see Verizon as the likely buyer.

But Verizon has sent some signals it does not need to buy Dish Network's spectrum. Perhaps that is because it always is possible that Sprint might sell some of its excess spectrum to Verizon, instead.

Dish Network's chairman is, quite literally, a gambler, so the gamble is not unusual. Some might prefer that Dish Network create a new network and get into the mobile market. 

Some might argue Dish Network will launch a bid to buy all or at least majority control of T-Mobile US. Others think Dish Network does not have the capital or borrowing power to do that.

Many have suggested Dish Network could lease network facilities from Sprint, for example, rapidly gaining the network infrastructure it requires.

Beyond all that, there is the question of business model. Would Dish Network have much success competing as a traditional mobile service provider? Or must it gamble on creating a whole network primarily to deliver mobile video entertainment? And, if so, does the business model work?

Dish Network's most-recent spectrum winnings do not settle the matter, one way or the other.

The Slow Mo Guys are at it again, and this time they've used their slow motion cameras to record the lightning-fast process behind snapping a picture.

The video, filmed using a Phantom Flex at 10,000 frames per second, does a great job showing what happens between the time you press the camera button and when the shutter opens and closes.

This particular example shows how a "rolling shutter" works on a typical DSLR camera that's had the lens removed.

A mirror placed at a 45-degree angle allows you to gaze through the viewfinder and see exactly what the lens sees, but that mirror gets in the way of the sensor. So in order to clear the path from the light to the sensor, the mirror flips upward and out of the way, while the mechanical shutter rolls away to reveal the sensor. The sensor captures an image, and the shutter rolls in front of it again and the mirror snaps back into place.

All this happens in less than a second, all you hear is the sound of all the parts moving in tandem.

It's a fascinating process, and the video below has more examples of what happens when you adjust the exposure of a photo, which can cause the shutter to expose the sensor for longer or shorter amounts of time.

No wonder DSLR cameras cost so much.

SEE ALSO: How To Watch The Super Bowl For Free — Even Without A Cable Subscription

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By Michael Finneran
More details on Google's wireless plans emerge while Cablevision takes the wraps off a service of its own.

Unified Communication eaten by Messaging?

Funny how timing is. Right after I publish a post on NoJitter about how Unified Communications vendors don’t understand their own market (hint: companies like Slack & HipChat as competitors), to some criticism – and Slack “decides” to conveniently join the game by acquiring Screenhero.

To be clear, I am using Slack, but I have never been in contact with any of their people. I have been following Screenhero since 2013, but never really talked to them either.

Who’s Slack?

Slack does project management. They solve the problem of communicating inside an organization.

Chris Kranky wrote about it, so I won’t repeat it here.

I liked this explanation best:

What’s more to say? If you want to solve communications you need search. Unified Communications doesn’t have any real search to speak of.

One of the disadvantages of Slack was its lack of real time voice/video communications when needed. Voice and video are now solved (to some extent).

Who’s Screenhero?

Screenhero is a WebRTC based startup that built a collaborative screensharing service.

It started as doing screensharing exclusively and then added voice into it.

The Screenhero team made modifications to the codebase of WebRTC and packaged it as a app just to fit it to their use case. It will be interesting to see if Slack will “leave it as is” or try to implement it on top of the browser’s WebRTC implementation natively instead.

More details in this technical session:

There’s more details about the acquisition on Screenhero’s blog.

For me, they are still a WebRTC vendor.

Why is this important?

We’re just in January and we’re at our first WebRTC acquisition of the year.

This acquisition is all about technology and has nothing to do with market share or business models. Slack needed the capability of realtime collaboration and now it has it. Notice the title of Screenhero’s CEO, Sherwani, is now “Director of Realtime Communication Products”? This can easily progress to video sessions if Slack so chooses.

This is another area where a seemingly unrelated service targeted at the enterprise veers towards unified communications and it does that by using WebRTC. In this case through an acquisition. The basis of unified communications is now a lot easier to implement with WebRTC, downgrading it from a service to a feature. Unified communications players should start thinking seriously how do they maintain their market position, which involves reaching to adjacent domains and not sticking to what they know.

Running your own service based on WebRTC? Offering WebRTC tools for developers? Don't miss out on this opportunity and register your company for free on the WebRTC Index.

The post Slack Acquires Screenhero… and Joins the WebRTC Ecosystem appeared first on BlogGeek.me.

Evernote Scannable can help you manage those stacks of business cards you have stashed in your drawer.

There are few things worse than sitting through a tedious office meeting thinking about all of the more worthwhile tasks you could be doing.

Brad Feld, co-founder and managing director at Boulder, Colo.-based firm Foundry Group, has a few hacks that could help you make the most of your work day.

Feld's most recent blog post focuses on tips for avoiding long rambling meetings, but there are a few other worthwhile insights as well. Here are some of the highlights:

Schedule all meetings for 30 minutes. According to Feld, 30 minutes is the perfect time allotment to fit in all of the important points in a meeting while keeping your day moving. Feld also notes you should consider ending meetings early. If you close a meeting when you feel it's done or set a specific limit like 30 minutes, you'll cut out pointless chatter such as intros and catch-ups. 

Consider going on a walk instead of booking a meeting room. Feld says walks are excellent for longer, more thoughtful discussions. He takes the same route with each walk, and depending on how long the conversation takes he circles that loop one or several times. This makes it easy to extend a meeting or cut it off early.

Schedule all phone calls to keep your phone from constantly ringing. If you schedule all of your calls, you'll know exactly when to expect them, which can help keep your day in order. Only high priority calls interrupt Feld from whatever he's doing, which prevents him from being distracted with calls all day. 

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By Michelle Burbick
Switch app moves out of beta, gives enterprises a way to support voice and other communications capabilities in Google Apps.

Slack has announced the acquisition of Y combinator alum Screenhero, and will be integrating that company's voice, video, and screen sharing capabilities into Slack over time. Screenhero will continue to operate…

Amazon is launching a corporate email and calendar service called WorkMail to take on Microsoft and Google, Forbes contributor Ben Kepes reports.

"Customers are not happy with their current email solution,” Adam Selipsky, an executive with Amazon Web Services, told the Wall Street Journal. “A lot of customers feel those solutions are expensive and complex.”

The company boasts that its services will be more simple and secure than those of Google, which offers its Google for Work suite, or Microsoft, which has its Office 365 services.

WorkMail is replacing the "unseen technology" behind corporate email. That means employees using Amazon's product will still be able to use existing front-end email services like Microsoft Outlook, although they will also have an Amazon-created option. If a company already uses a bunch of Amazon Web Services products, integrating WorkMail might be an appealing option. 

Amazon will encrypt email data but the companies themselves will have the encryption keys (meaning if an Amazon data center was hacked, it still wouldn't be possible to read the stored corporate emails). Also, companies will be able to make specifications about where, geographically, their data is stored (both for lower latency and regional compliance reason, according to Kepes). 

Amazon WorkMail will cost $4 per user per month for a 50GB mailbox, Kepes reports, and the service will launch in Q2. 

 

SEE ALSO: A Man Who Worked For Amazon And Microsoft Explains How The Two Companies Party Differently

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If you're looking to buy a new Android phone sometime soon, you might want to hold off until next month.

Motorola is offering a decent discount that cuts $140 off any purchase of $449 or more through its website — meaning you can get the 64GB Moto X off-contract for $360 instead of $500 (via The Verge).

The 64GB model is Motorola's Pure edition of the phone, meaning it comes with a completely clean version of Android that doesn't include any carrier bloatware.

You can also get the $400 Moto X with a few accessories at a cheaper price. For example, the 32GB Moto X second-generation Moto X with a $20 case and Motorola's Turbo $35 charger would usually cost $455. But, during the discount period, you'll be able to get the phone with those accessories for $315.

The Nexus 6 is excluded from this deal, however, and you have to register for a special promo code between noon and 1 p.m. Eastern on Feb. 2. Once you have the code, you can place your order anytime before Feb. 14. Motorola is also offering a separate deal that lets you get $100 of a $500 purchase and $35 off a $250 purchase with no promotion code needed. 

When we reviewed the second-generation Moto X, we called it one of the best phones of the year. Even if you don't get the Pure version, Motorola barely puts any skin over its modified version of Android which makes it much easier to use than some of its competitors.

Motorola's newer flagship comes with a large full HD screen, a faster processor than its predecessor, and a feature that lets you talk to Google Now without even touching the device. It's the perfect phone for Android fans that want a simple phone with a great screen that truly feels like a Google-powered device.

SEE ALSO: This Super Cheap Android Phone Looks Exactly Like The iPhone 6

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