Foxconn plans to build five additional factories in Brazil to produce liquid crystal displays for future Apple products. The plan was announced by the Secretary of Planning and Development for the State of São Paulo, Julio Semeghini, and reported by Brazilian news outlet, Folha. The five factories are in addition to the one already believed to producing iPads and iPhones, and each is reportedly set to employ roughly 1,000 workers. In addition to building Apple products, the factories will also manufacture no...

Nokia announced on Wednesday that it has officially sold its 1.5 billionth S40-powered cell phone since the first S40 device — the Nokia 7110 — was released in 1999. A 21-year old Brazilian woman made the historic purchase in São Paulo, the company said, noting that the woman purchased a Nokia Asha 303 from a Magazine Luiza store. “We are incredibly proud to reach this milestone,” said Mary McDowell, Executive Vice President for Mobile Phones at Nokia. “Having 1.5 billion Series 40 de...

Foxconn’s plans to build a $12 billion factory in Brazil dedicated to producing iPads is “in doubt,” government officials in Brazil told Reuters. Reportedly, negotiations have stalled because both sides have yet to reach an agreement on tax breaks for Foxconn. Additionally, Brazil may not be able to populate the factory with enough skilled laborers. Worse still, Brazil has been tasked with building infrastructure for the 2014 World Cup followed by the Olympics two years later. Skeptics argue...

Apple has reportedly cut its fourth-quarter iPad orders to China-based manufacturing partners by 25%, JP Morgan analysts Mark Moskowitz and Gokul Hariharan wrote in a research note on Sunday. According to Bloomberg, JP Morgan expects Hon Hai’s iPad 2 production to drop from 17 million units to 13 million units in the fourth quarter as a result of the cut, though Moskowitz did not adjust his earlier iPad shipment projections of 10.9 million units and 12 million units in the third and fourth calendar qua...

Facebook now has 750 million monthly active users worldwide, TechCrunch reported on Friday. That’s incredible growth since our June 1st story, which suggested that the social network was closing in on 700,000,000 users worldwide. In that report, emerging markets showed the most growth —  Brazil’s user base jumped 11.4% in May alone — and the United States was the top country; U.S. users were responsible for 149.4 million Facebook accounts. Last July, Facebook announced that it had hit the 500...

The list of hacked Sony properties continues to grow as Sony Music Brazil finds its website the latest victim in a long line of breaches. The company’s website was the target of a cyberattack on Saturday night and nearly 36 hours later, the site is still offline. Initially, the hackers defaced the site with a single page titled “Hacked The UnderTaker,” which apparently contained nicknames of several people responsible for the attack. More than 12 hours later, the website was finally taken o...

Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. Ltd.-owned Foxconn is considering spending up to $12 billion on new facilities in Brazil that would help the electronics manufacturer’s clients avoid high import taxes on devices shipped to key markets from China and Taiwan. The move would also potentially help the manufacturer avoid some of its rising labor costs in China. The Brazilian government says it is currently studying Foxconn’s plans, and the country’s President Dilma Rousseff is overseas discussing t...

It looks as though Gizmodo Brazil got their hands on a yet-to-be-announced Android handset from device manufacturer Motorola. The full touch-screen device, which is being described as a Motorola BACKFLIP without the keyboard, is running Android 1.5 and is cloaked in the MOTOBLUR UI. Giz Brazil didn’t report on any specifications, however we can tell from the images the phone is SIM based, has a 3.5 mm headphone jack, micro-SD slot, and camera with flash. The phone is rumored to be released in March, alt...

Not content with Motorola’s Brazilian division handsets, Moto has just recently announced the MOTOCUBO A45, an eco-friendly full-QWERTY featurephone. It’s nowhere near as sustainable as Motorola’s previous green offering or even Samsung’s or Sony Ericsson’s, but 25% of the materials used in MOTOCUBO are made out of recycled plastic bottles which has to count for something. Why? Because a 2 megapixel camera, QVGA disaply and EDGE connectivity sure doesn’t. Look for the MOTOC...