U.S. consumers are more interested in Samsung HDTV models than any other brand, according to a recent study from ABI Research. The South Korean manufacturer captured the top spot with 20% of respondents citing interest in a Samsung HDTV, passing Sony, which had previously held a commanding lead with 27% before dropping eight points to 19% in this latest poll. Consumer interest in LG’s HDTVs increased from 6% to 12%, while interest in Vizio jumped from 8% to 11%. “Regardless how long-lasting this...

Market research firm Nielsen on Thursday announced that as of February 2012, about half of all mobile subscribers in the United States own a smartphone. In the same month last year, only 36% of U.S. mobile subscribers owned smartphones. Almost half of all smartphones, or 48%, are powered by Google’s Android operating system, with Apple’s iPhone representing 32% of the market and Research in Motion’s BlackBerry platform capturing an 11.6% share. Of those who recently acquired a smartphone, h...

Proview International on February 17th asked a California court to prevent Apple from using the iPad name in the United States, Bloomberg reports. The Chinese company — which Apple claims sold it the rights to the iPad trademark in 10 countries, including China — says Apple subsidiary IP Application Development Ltd. made “false” statements to Proview before the sale and is now asking a Superior Court in Santa Clara to nullify the deal. A court in Shanghai on Thursday rejected Proview’s reque...

On Friday, the Chinese company that claims to hold the trademark on the “iPad” name, threatened to sue Apple in the U.S. for $2 billion dollars, reports the AFP. Proview Technology claims it owns the Chinese rights to the iPad name and the company’s lawyers are looking to prevent Apple from importing or exporting the popular tablet in China. “Right now we are selecting from three American law firms to sue Apple in the United States for $2 billion in compensation,” said the chairm...

Aneesh Chopra will step down from his position as the United States chief technology officer. The move is expected to be imminent and, while it’s unclear what Chopra’s next step will be, Fedscoop says sources have speculated Chopra is interested in running for political office or working as the head of a major technology firm in the Washington, D.C. area. Chopra was appointed U.S. CTO in April 2009 by President Obama. Fedscoop said possible replacements for Chopra’s position include Vetera...

Motorola Mobility has filed a patent lawsuit against Apple in a Florida federal court. The phone maker is accusing Apple of infringing on six patents related to messaging, antennas, software and data filtering with its mobile devices, Reuters said. Motorola also argued that Apple’s iPhone 4S specifically infringes on one of its patents. Just two weeks ago, the International Trade Commission (ITC) ruled that Motorola’s handsets did not infringe three Apple patents. The Mannheim Regional Court i...

Phone maker ZTE recently said that it sees the United States and China as the two largest markets for smartphone sales growth. “The United States and China will be key engines driving our smartphone sales,” ZTE’s head of handset strategy Lv Qianhao, told Reuters in a recent interview, noting that the company expects its worldwide smartphone shipments to double in 2012 and to increase by 30% to 40% annually through 2015. ZTE mostly sells Android-powered smartphones but said it plans to launc...

Samsung recently announced that it has shipped more than 1 million Galaxy Note smartphones. The Galaxy Note, often considered a mix between a tablet and a smartphone due to its size, was first unveiled in September and it features a massive 5.3-inch display with a 1280 x 800-pixel resolution. Other features include a 1.4GHz processor, an 8-megapixel camera and a 2-megapixel front-facing camera for video chats. Samsung also confirmed Thursday that the Galaxy Note will be released in the United States next year...

It may seem like everyone around you owns a smartphone but that’s hardly the case on a global scale. Global smartphone penetration is just now nearing 10%, according to new research published by TomiAhonen Consulting. The firm compiled information from Netsize Guide, Informa, Google and Ipsos to grab a snapshot of smartphone penetration in 42 major countries covering 72% of global mobile phone subscriptions. Singapore has the largest recorded feature phone to smartphone migration rate (54%) followed by...

Sony Ericsson announced on Tuesday that its Xperia arc S and Xperia neo V are now available unlocked in the United States from Sony Store locations. The Xperia arc S runs Android 2.3.4 (Gingerbread) and is equipped with a 1.4GHz processor, an 8.1-megapixel camera, a 4.2-inch “Reality” display and support for 3D and 2D sweep panorama photography. The Xperia arc S is available in white, black, blue and silver for $529.99 without a contract. Sony Ericsson’s Xperia neo V also runs Android 2.3....

Nokia’s CEO Stephen Elop took the stage at Nokia World on Tuesday and unveiled the Nokia Lumia 800 and Lumia 710, the company’s first Windows Phone devices. Unfortunately, however, the Finnish phone maker said neither phone will land in the United States this year. Instead, U.S. residents will have to wait until “early 2012″ for Nokia to introduce a “portfolio of products” for the U.S. The comments don’t completely rule out the possibility that we’ll see a versi...

Spotify now has more than 250,000 subscribers in the United States, Reuters reported recently. The service also now has more than 2 million paid subscribers around the globe. The figures have not yet been confirmed by Spotify, but Reuters said CEO Daniel Ek disclosed the numbers in September. Spotify, which made its U.S. debut in July, offers users free ad-supported access to a library with millions of songs. It also offers a $4.99 monthly option with unlimited streaming and no ads, or a $9.99 subscription th...

Steve Jobs made contact with Samsung in an effort to resolve a patent argument last year, Bloomberg reported on Thursday. However, Jobs did not participate in the discussions that eventually took place and deteriorated, Apple’s patent attorney Richard Lutton explained during a hearing in an Australian court. “Samsung is an important supplier with whom we have a deep relationship” Lutton said while being questioned by a Samsung lawyer. “We wanted to give them a chance to do the right th...

Samsung announced on Tuesday that its Galaxy Tab 8.9 Android tablet will be available in the United States beginning on October 2nd. There are two models of the Galaxy Tab 8.9, a 32GB version that will cost $569 and a 16GB model priced at $469. The Galaxy Tab 8.9 measures just 8.5mm thin and runs Samsung’s TouchWiz user interface on top of Android 3.1 (Honeycomb). The Galaxy Tab 8.9 is powered by a dual-core NVIDIA Tegra 2 T250S processor, has a 6,100 mAh battery, a 3-megapixel camera, a 2-megapixel fro...