A pair of workers who claim to have been poisoned by toxins in a Suzhou, China factory while assembling touchscreens for Apple’s iPhone have written an open letter begging consumers to demand reform. SumOfUs, the organization behind the Ethical iPhone Campaign, released the letter in an email to the media on Wednesday afternoon. The letter was written by Guo Rui-qiang and Jia Jing-chuan, two former factory workers who urge consumers to sign SumOfUs’s petition and demand that Apple force its suppliers and manufacturing partners to improve working conditions at their Chinese factories. Both workers claim to have been poisoned by a chemical cleaner called N-hexane, and they have suffered neurological damage as a result. The Fair Labor Association is currently conduction inspections of two Foxconn factories, prompted by Apple, and while only preliminary inspections have been made at this point, the organization says it has already found “tons of issues.” The workers’ letter follows below in its entirety.

Dear SumOfUs Members and Friends -

You don’t know us but you have seen our work. Until recently, we worked long hours assembling Apple’s iPhone touch screens in Suzhou, China.

In early 2010, it was independently confirmed that 137 workers, including us, were poisoned by a chemical called n-hexane which was used to clean iPhone screens. N-hexane is known to cause eye, skin and respiratory tract irritation, and leads to persistant nerve damage. Apple admitted to gross labour rights violations more than a year later.

If more people know about what we went through, Apple will feel pressured to change so other workers don’t have to suffer like we did.

Can you share this letter with your friends, and ask them to join you in signing our petition calling for a reform of working conditions at their factories?

We have been pressuring Apple, and its new CEO Tim Cook, for years to compensate those of us who were injured working for them, and demanding reform of working conditions at their Chinese factories so that their workers don’t suffer like we do. Now we need your help as customers or potential customers of Apple.

We need your help to send a message to Apple before their shareholder meeting on Thursday, Feb. 23rd. We want to see a strict corporate social responsibility and reform of the audit system to prevent similar tragedies in the future. He will listen to you as current or potential consumers.

You’ve already signed the petition, and 82,000 others have too — for that, we thank you. We believe it’d be symbolicly powerful if 100,000 people signed the petition before SumOfUs delivers it to Tim Cook on Thursday at their shareholder meeting. We’re really close to that goal, but we need you to share our request with your friends to get over the edge.

Can you share our letter with your friends, and ask them to sign the petition too?

It has been over two years since many of us were hospitalized and treated but our debilitating symptoms continue. Rui-Qiang still can’t find work because he can no longer stand for the long hours most jobs require. Jing-Chuan has to spend nearly $100 a month on health supplements.

But with all of us working together to pressure Apple to change, we can make sure what happened to us doesn’t happen to others too.

-       Guo Rui-qiang and Jia Jing-chuan

Whether you’re fan of Apple products or not, there is no denying the influence Steve Jobs had on the world. Simon Lau — a freelance Web, iPhone and iPad developer — built a tribute to Mr. Jobs using Facebook’s Timeline feature. Facebook’s Timeline replaces a user’s traditional profile page with life events, check-ins, new friends additions, photos and more, all listed in chronological order. Lau’s Timeline of Jobs, which was promptly removed by Facebook only to later be restored, features an array of photos and life events that highlight the Apple co-founder’s time on Earth. Hit the break for a video showcasing Steve Jobs’s Timeline.

[Via Gizmodo]

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According to a leaked accessory sheet, the HTC Ville and Huawei Prism are headed to T-Mobile in the U.S. The sheet, a screenshot of which was obtained by TmoNews, provides little information outside of device names and “warehouse arrival” dates for various accessories. Accessories, which sometimes arrive weeks before a handset launches, are set to arrive for both devices in early April. BGR exclusively reported this past November that HTC will unveil the Ville at next week’s Mobile World Congress trade show. The device is rumored to be thinner than Apple’s iPhone 4S and will feature Android 4.0, Sense 4.0, a 4.3-inch qHD Super AMOLED display, a 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon Series 4 processor, an 8-megapixel camera, HSPA+ and a 1,650 mAh battery.

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You know what they say about guys with huge phones… They’re compensating for tiny data plans. Samsung’s Galaxy Note is a giant smartphone. Or a teeny tablet. After using AT&T’s version of this device for several days now, I’m still not quite sure which is the case. It handles voice calls like a cell phone and it runs Google’s Android 2.3.6 Gingerbread smartphone operating system, but it feels very much like a tablet and it includes a stylus, which hasn’t been seen alongside a smartphone in this hemisphere for quite some time. Somehow, however, Samsung manages to pull it all together into one interesting package that might not have been worth the $10 million introduction, but it could certainly find a niche in today’s supersized smartphone market. Maybe.

The Inside

Samsung’s Galaxy Note has plenty of room for cutting-edge technology within its cavernous case, and though we are on the verge of seeing the first crop of quad-core smartphones unveiled next week at the annual Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona, Spain, the Galaxy Note has specs that will still pack a punch once the dust from MWC clears.

A dual-core 1.5GHz processor powers the Galaxy Note and it does a fantastic job of allowing the user to dart around Android 2.3.6 with ease. Scrolling in several apps that are notoriously problematic on Android devices seemed noticeably smoother on this handset than on other Gingerbread phones, and I haven’t really managed to trip up the Galaxy Note even with a number of apps running in the background. Of course there are exceptions thanks to poorly made applications like the official Twitter app, but issues that lie in the hands of developers certainly can’t be blamed on the Note.

The Galaxy Note includes 16GB of internal storage and another 32GB can be added thanks to microSDHC support. And that external storage might come in handy considering all the extra apps and services that come pre-installed on this device. Beyond the AllShare DLNA sharing app, City ID, Amazon Kindle, Facebook, Samsung Social Hub and qik Video Chat, there are a number of AT&T-brand apps that come on the Galaxy Note. Included among them are AT&T Navigator, AT&T FamilyMap, AT&T U-verse Live TV, YPmobile, AT&T Address Book, AT&T Messages, myAT&T and AT&T Code Scanner.

I’m not quite sure how this happened, but the Galaxy Note only has a 2,500 mAh battery. “Only” is an odd word to be using in reference to a 2,500 mAh smartphone battery, but Motorola managed to squeeze a 3,300 mAh power pack into the significantly smaller DROID RAZR MAXX. The Note’s big beautiful display could’ve used a bit more juice than is currently afforded by the 2,500 mAh battery pack, and I was able to get about a day of usage out of a single charge. Compared to the 60 hours I was getting out of the RAZR MAXX, the Note was a bit disappointing.

An embedded 4G LTE radio is also found within Samsung’s Galaxy Note, and it too could have used some extra juice. AT&T’s LTE service is plenty fast — I saw speeds in and around New York City that reached as high as 18Mbps down and 5Mbps up — but 4G connectivity is another feature that takes a toll on battery life.

UPDATE: A typo in the paragraph above was fixed to reflect peak download speeds of 18Mbps, rather than 8Mbps as previously stated.

The Outside

The Galaxy Note isn’t just the largest smartphone Samsung has ever made, it’s also the most solid. In fact, it’s not even close.

I regularly take Samsung to task with regard to the quality of its hardware, which has historically been sub par compared to rival devices. I often call Samsung phones “diamonds in the rough” because the displays are always so fantastically vivid while the hardware that encases them is typically reminiscent of a $10 Playskool toy. I probably explained my position best in my Galaxy S II review this past October: “Mounting Samsung displays in the cases that often surround them is akin to mounting a flawless 4-carat diamond on the base of a ring pop.”

The Galaxy S II improved matters a bit and the Galaxy Nexus is a marginal improvement as well, but the unibody aluminum cases on some HTC smartphones or the glass and the brushed aluminum construction of the iPhone 4S puts this South Korea-based vendor’s hardware to shame.

Samsung’s Galaxy Note is a different beast. The company still opted for plastics over more desirable materials for the exterior construction of the handset, but the result is infinitely more solid than other Galaxy phones.

The Note has a good weight to it. It’s light for its size, thankfully, and the back of the device is made of solid glossy plastic as opposed to the flimsy textured plastic Samsung has been using in a number of its smartphones recently. I generally prefer a soft-touch feel on smartphones but the solid hard plastic works well on this particular device. The bezel around the edges of the phone is hard plastic as well, and the face is glass.

The top edge of the Galaxy Note is home to a standard 3.5-millimeter audio jack as well as a small secondary microphone for noise cancellation. The right edge holds only the power/lock/unlock button and the left edge has the device’s volume rocker. The bottom of phone includes a microUSB port, the device’s main microphone and a slot in which the “S Pen” stylus sits securely. On the back of the Note lies the camera lens and LED flash, as well as a small opening near the bottom for the speaker. Like so many other Samsung smartphones, the Note does not take great still images despite its 8-megapixel sensor. They’re adequate as long as lighting is decent, but I found 1080p HD videos captured by the Galaxy Note to be far more impressive than photographs.

On the front of Samsung’s Galaxy Note sits a massive 5.3-inch Super AMOLED display with 1,280 x 800-pixel HD resolution. A thin slot for the ear speaker is positioned above an AT&T logo to the north of the display, and sensors are positioned to the right of the speaker along with a front-facing camera for video chats and self portraits. Beneath the screen, there is a Samsung logo along with the four standard Android navigation buttons.

A side note regarding this phone’s display: in 2012, there is just no excuse for launching a new smartphone without an effective oleophobic coating on the screen. The Galaxy Nexus picks up far less grease than the Galaxy Note, so it is quite clear that Samsung and its manufacturing partners are capable of making a handset that doesn’t look like its owner used it to fry bacon after just a few minutes of tapping and swiping.

The Upside

The high definition Super AMOLED display on Samsung’s Galaxy Note is absolutely breathtaking.

Samsung smartphones are known for their stunning screens and the Note is no exception. And although the display on this handset is a “Super AMOLED” and not a “Super AMOLED Plus,” it is easily one of the most gorgeous displays I have ever seen on a smartphone.

The Galaxy Note’s 1,280 x 800-pixel HD resolution gives remarkable clarity to images and videos, and the colors shown off by Samsung’s AMOLED panel are nothing short of jaw-dropping. Combined with the massive size of the 5.3-inch display, the Galaxy Note affords a viewing experience unlike any other smartphone in the world. Watching streaming video is an absolute joy on the Note, and flipping through high resolution images is a pleasure as well. I also enjoyed reading books on the Galaxy Note using the Kobo app and Amazon’s Kindle app. While I find most phones far too small to be used as an eReader, this handset is a different story.

Most reviewers may disagree with me, but I also found Samsung’s S Pen stylus to be a great distinguishing feature on the Galaxy Note. Bear with me.

In Samsung’s booth at the Consumer Electronics Show last month, the company had a station set up where artists equipped with nothing more than a Galaxy Note and an S Pen would draw show-goers who were willing to sit and pose for a few minutes. The resulting drawings were often phenomenal, and I couldn’t believe anyone was able to create them on a smartphone, by hand, with nothing more than a stylus. Even still, it was probably the most ridiculous things I saw at CES this year, and I saw more dumb gadgets than I care to recount.

Artists are not going to buy the Galaxy Note to create digital masterpieces on the go because there are much, much better tools for the job. But even though the advent of capacitive smartphone touchscreens placed the mobile stylus on the endangered species list, there are still some great uses for a digital pen on a smartphone.

For one thing, handwriting recognition is still a big deal in several regions with complex written languages. Note-taking in any language is an enjoyable experience with the S Pen as well, and there is something to be said for owning a device where you (or your child) can draw pictures or add a personal touch to photos that can then immediately be emailed or delivered via MMS to friends and loved ones.

Samsung did a great job with its implementation of the smartphone stylus. For one thing, the S Pen has a unique feature that allows it to easily switch back and forth between duties as a writing implement and duties as a tool for navigation. A single button is all the S Pen needs — hold the button and swipe to perform a number of gesture-based controls, or release the button and use the stylus like a pen to draw or write. Users can also hold the button on the S Pen and tap twice on any screen to open a new blank note, or hold the button and long-tap on any screen to take a screenshot. That’s right, the Galaxy Nexus is a Gingerbread phone that can capture screenshots without the need for an SDK and a 37-step how-to guide.

The Downside

There is really no way to sugarcoat this and even if there was, I wouldn’t want to. You need to be warned: the Galaxy Note is too big.

This gargantuan handset cannot be comfortably operated with one hand by a normal-sized person or even a fairly large person. Not even close. I have dropped the phone at least half a dozen times just trying to scroll through a Web page with one hand. It’s also too big to comfortably type while holding the phone in landscape orientation. I asked several people to try and no one who did enjoyed the typing experience while in landscape orientation at all. Several people also complained that the phone was too top-heavy while typing in portrait orientation, though I personally didn’t find that to be the case.

Not everyone cares about how the world views them, but I have never seen a smartphone that draws peculiar stares and full fledged laughter like the Galaxy Note. Holding this beast to your face while on a phone call in public will result in awkward stares. Not “maybe” or “might,” but “will.” It just looks silly.

When I showed the phone to my wife and to friends, the reaction was always the same. First, confusion… What is it? Next, disbelief… You’re kidding. This is a phone? Finally, laughter… Ha! There’s no way I could ever carry this thing.

The Galaxy Note does not fit into the pockets of an average sized woman’s jeans. Considering the current state of fashion — Skinny jeans? Really, guys? — it probably wouldn’t fit into some pockets of an average sized man’s jeans either. I even found a few clutches in my wife’s closet that wouldn’t house the Note, and I have a couple pairs pants that just barely could contain this smartphone’s massive frame.

If you’re in the NBA, this is the perfect phone for you. If you rarely use your phone as a phone and you would rather carry a (barely) pocketable tablet than a puny smartphone, you’ve met your next handset. If you’re taking a trip to Brobdingnag and you want to show off some modern tech to the natives, the Galaxy Note should be your device of choice.

If you’re an average sized human looking for a smartphone, you should probably look elsewhere.

The Bottom Line

Android fans looking to turn heads should look no further. Short of luxury brands like Vertu and handsets encrusted with gems by third parties, there probably isn’t a cell phone on the planet that will attract more attention than the Galaxy Note. During my time with the device, I was approached by a number of people eager to figure out exactly what I was tapping away on. Most of them, however, seemed to walk away more confused than they were to begin with.

Samsung basically just “Samsunged” itself.

My sincere hope is that this is the turning point in the giant smartphone trend, and that we will now see smartphones shrink back down to manageable sizes. Having a handful of plus-sized handsets on the market is a good thing. Choice is a good thing. Smartphones like the Galaxy Note and LG Vu have taken things too far though, and they are well-suited to such a small subset of smartphone users that they likely need not exist.

If the Galaxy Note was about 20% smaller, it would be a fantastic smartphone. If it was 20% larger, it would be a terrific little tablet. At 5.78 x 3.27 x 0.38 inches, however, it’s an answer without a question.

A new bug has been discovered in iOS 5.0.1 that provides unauthorized access to a user’s contacts on passcode-protected iPhones. The bug, which was discovered by iPhoneIslam, is not easily reproduced and requires the attacker to have a spare SIM card or access to the victim’s phone number. The method involves inserting and ejecting the iPhone’s SIM card, which will eventually bypass the phone’s passcode and give unauthorized access to the contacts and phone app. The attacker can then make calls, view call history, view contacts and use FaceTime. The threat is seen as a somewhat minor issue that Apple will most likely fix in an upcoming iOS update.

[Via The Verge]

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Authorities in Germany recently executed a raid that resulted in at least two arrests and the takedown of another popular file-sharing service. German-language news site Heise Online reported earlier this week that German police arrested two men with alleged ties to file-sharing service Skyload.net, which was subsequently taken offline. The service’s owner, identified as 28-year-old Maik P., was taken into custody along with 25-year-old Marcel E., owner of Skyload.net’s Web hosting service. Both men have been charged with violating copyright laws and Maik P. is allegedly personally responsible for uploading and sharing more than 10,000 copyrighted films. The Skyload.net takedown follows the closure of one of the most popular file-sharing services in the world, Megaupload, which was taken offline last month as its founder and a number of other men with ties to the service were arrested in a raid. While shuttering Megaupload appears to have done nothing to slow digital piracy, authorities around the world continue to battle alongside copyright holders to shut down file-hosting services that allow users to share copyrighted content illegally.

[Via TorrentFreak]

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We have received a number of reports this morning from Verizon Wireless customers complaining that the carrier’s 4G LTE network was down in various parts of the country. The carrier’s support forums have also been flooded with complaints from irate users who claim the service is down across the country, and Verizon customers service representatives have reportedly confirmed the outage to a number of subscribers. Verizon customers have suffered from data problems before — the carrier recently had three massive outages in a single month.

UPDATE: Verizon says all issues have been resolved and its 4G LTE network came back up around 1:00 p.m. Eastern.

Apple on Wednesday defended itself in a Shanghai court against Proview International, which claims Apple is violating a trademark it holds on the “iPad” name, the New York Times reported. Proview’s allegations have prevented the Cupertino-based company from selling its popular tablet in numerous smaller Chinese cities, however Apple Stores in Beijing and Shanghai continue to sell the device. The four-hour session at the Pudong New Area People’s Court ended without any ruling from the district judge, though both sides reportedly presented new evidence in the case. Apple claims it acquired the iPad trademark from Proview in 2009. “We bought Proview’s worldwide rights to the iPad trademark in 10 different countries several years ago,” the company said in a statement. “Proview refuses to honor their agreement with Apple in China and a Hong Kong court has sided with Apple in this matter. Our case is still pending in mainland China.” Proview claims that Apple is using the iPad name illegally, however, as the subsidiary that licensed the trademark to Apple was not authorized to do so.

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Foxconn workers claim the manufacturer transferred underage employees to other departments or did not schedule them to work overtime in an effort to avoid discovery during the Fair Labor Association’s investigation of its facilities, reports AppleInsider. Students & Scholars Against Corporate Misbehavior (SACOM) project officer Debby Sze Wan Chan was told by two Foxconn employees that the manufacturer “prepared for the inspection” by hiding the child laborers. “All underage workers, between 16-17 years old, were not assigned any overtime work and some of them were even sent to other departments,” Chan reportedly said. Another Foxconn worker said she had recently been allowed three breaks a day during the audit, an increase from one. Apple CEO Tim Cook has said that the company “cares about every worker in our supply chain,” however many workers don’t feel the care that the CEO talks about. “Most of the time, the workers are aware of the presence of Apple’s representatives inside the factories,” said Chan. “It is not the problem that Apple doesn’t know the real problems at their suppliers. They know, but it is only because they do not care.”

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Internet-enabled televisions have become the next big thing. LG, Sony, Panasonic, Samsung and Sharp, among others, offer TV sets with apps and Wi-Fi connectivity. Just because someone has an Internet TV, however, doesn’t mean he or she it using it. “People are buying connected TVs, but they are not all using them,” said Norm Bogen, vice president for digital entertainment at research firm NPD In-Stat. According to a survey conducted by In-Stat, only 47% of all people who own an Internet-enabled TV have it connected to the Web, reports TechNewsDaily. Among those that are connected to home networks, a majority of the TV’s features go unused. “I think that people like some aspects of smart TVs,” said Paul Gagnon, the director of DisplaySearch. “Social networking and games — those are pretty lightly used. People type on laptops and mobile devices.” Gagnon explains that televisions’ ugly and cluttered user interfaces could be the reason for the lack of enthusiasm. “They’re very, very complex and unintuitive user interfaces,” he said.

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Samsung may be looking to launch its own cloud service to compete with Apple’s iCloud. The South Korean manufacturer originally enlisted Samsung SDS to develop the infrastructure behind the company’s new “S-Cloud” service, however it turned out to be unsuitable for the global market, reports ETNews. The company’s Media Solution Center (SMSC) is now reportedly looking to establish an infrastructure by utilizing proven commercial solutions from KT or even Amazon to help build its cloud network. The publication states that the service will more than likely be delayed due to the heavy modifications to its infrastructure.

[Via Engadget]

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LG on Tuesday announced three more Android smartphones ahead of next week’s Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona, Spain. The “L-style” series will feature the Optimus L3 (3.2-inch), L5 (4-inch) and L7 (4.3-inch), three smartphones for design-conscious consumers. “Design is consistently the top or second most important factor for customers when choosing a mobile phone,” president and CEO of LG Mobile Dr. Jong-seok Park said. “With smartphones, we sometimes took a more functional approach to design but with L-Style we’re going back to our roots as a company focused on how our products fit into the lifestyle of our customers.” The “L-style” focuses on five major design elements: modern square style, “floating display” technology, more intuitive arrangement of keys, metallic accents and a “sensuous slim shape” to naturally draw one’s attention. The L5 and L7 will both launch with Android 4.0 in the first half the year and the L3 Gingerbread phone will be released in March.

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Samsung on Tuesday announced two new additions to the company’s Galaxy smartphone line; the Galaxy Ace 2 and Galaxy mini 2. The Ace 2 features an 800MHz dual-core processor with a 3.8-inch WVGA display. The handset is also equipped with a 5-megapixel rear camera, VGA front facing one, Android 2.3, 4GB of internal storage and a microSD slot. The mini 2 comes with an 800MHz processor and a 3.27-inch HVGA display with a 3-megapixel rear camera, microSD slot and Android 2.3. Both devices also ship with Samsung’s ChatON, Social Hub and Music Hub services, allowing one-step access to social networks and over 17 million songs. The GALAXY Ace 2 will be available in the U.K. in April, and the GALAXY mini 2 will be available in France in March before being rolled out globally. Samsung has not announced any details with regard to a North American launch. Read on for Samsung’s press release.

Samsung introduces the new GALAXY Ace 2 and GALAXY mini 2

Welcome to Samsung’s AndroidTM experience with the two new members of GALAXY smartphones

SEOUL, Korea – February 21, 2012 – Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced two new additions to the GALAXY smartphone range: GALAXY Ace 2, which will be available in UK from April, and GALAXY mini 2, which will be available in France from March before being rolled out globally.

Building on the market success of GALAXY Ace and GALAXY mini since their release last year, GALAXY Ace 2 and GALAXY mini 2 are ideal devices for users with active lifestyles who value individuality and style without compromising on performance or affordability.

“Launched in 2011, GALAXY Ace and GALAXY mini have been a huge success in the global market. Today, we introduce GALAXY Ace 2 and GALAXY mini 2 with upgraded features and services,” said JK Shin, President of IT & Mobile Communications Division at Samsung Electronics. “Our goal remains the same—to continue to create new and improved mobile experiences that deliver something suitable for everyone. This is the hallmark of Samsung’s GALAXY range and what has made the GALAXY brand such a runaway hit with consumers around the world.”

Double-Engine Power, GALAXY Ace 2

GALAXY Ace 2 delivers efficient multitasking, lightning-fast screen transitions and high-quality graphics for even the most demanding applications and games. HSPA 14.4 connectivity provides an enhanced browsing experience and fast content downloads with minimal lag-times. Additionally, 4GB of internal storage ensures that films, photos and a whole array of personal multimedia content can be easily stored and taken out and about; a 1,500mAh battery adds to GALAXY Ace 2’s on-the-go performance for active, demanding use.

Enhanced Samsung Hubs and ChatON services ensure that users are never far from the content or social connections they care about. Music Hub allows one-step access to over 17 million tracks at anytime; Game Hub offers users the very latest gaming titles; Social Hub allows users to view their instant messages, social network and email communications all in one single inbox. Samsung’s ChatON service connects users with other phone users – across any platform – into a single community, providing easy multi-format instant messaging and group chatting.

Compact and Trendy for more fun, GALAXY mini 2

GALAXY mini 2 packs a real performance punch into its slim and colorful 11.9mm-thick casing. The 3.27” HVGA touch-screen enables high-quality multimedia viewing while maintaining the device’s portability.

The compact GALAXY mini 2 ensures comfortable Web browsing and easily handles the demands of the most resource-intensive applications. An improved 1,300mAh battery capacity also guarantees extended multimedia usage and longer chat sessions. 4GB of storage allows users to comfortably store videos, music and images.

Like GALAXY Ace 2, GALAXY mini 2 keeps users connected through ChatON and Social Hub, while Music Hub allows one-step access to over 17 million tracks at any time.

Samsung has partnered with Blockbuster to stream thousands of movies to the company’s smartphones, tablets, ultrabooks, laptops, smart TVs and Blu-ray players, reports Smarthouse. The service will reportedly be rolled out in the United States and Europe in the first half of 2012, with an Australian scheduled to take place by early September. Samsung is also rumored to be developing a new global billing system that will allow users to easily log-in and pay for media content right from their devices. Blockbuster is the largest provider of rental movies in Australia, although in recent years the company has lost ground to both Netflix and Redbox. The deal is considered a win-win “for both Samsung, Blockbuster and Australian movie watchers,” according to Paul Uniacke the CEO of the Franchise Entertainment Group who has the rights to the Blockbuster brand in Australia.

[Via TheNextWeb]

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LightSquared announced on Tuesday that the company plans to cut its workforce by 45% in an effort to cut costs. ”This and other cost savings measures will allow LightSquared to continue to navigate the regulatory process as it works with the appropriate government agencies to find solutions to the GPS interference issue and bring its $14 billion privately funded wireless broadband network to more than 260 million Americans,” the company said in a statement to Reuters. Last week, the FCC announced that it would block the company’s planned 4G LTE network due to issues concerning GPS interference. LightSquared currently employs 330 people and according to Reuters, the company is not currently considering bankruptcy.

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