Samsung Launches Lavender Series of LCD Monitors

Samsung India has announced the launch of a new series of LCDmonitors - Samsung Lavender - in the Indian market.

The new Lavender series is available in screen sizes of 21.5-inches and 23-inches and features the Touch of Color (ToC) design, a contrast ratio of 50000:1, a response time of 2 ms; viewing angle of 170/160 and a 16:9 wide format panel that is made for multimedia and optimized for HD Content .

Ranjit Singh Yadav, Director – IT Business, Samsung India, said, "In keeping with the global and Indian market trends where the 16:9 Wide format display monitors are rapidly becoming popular with consumers, we have introduced our stylish Lavender series in the Indian market , in the over 20-inch screen size segment."

The Lavender series has a slimmer neck compared to conventional models and has front OSD Touch buttons that emit red lighting from under the panel. Inspired by shifting colors of the sunset and ToC technology, the Lavender series eliminates the need of using non-biodegradable components in manufacturing of exterior panels, making it 100% recyclable and environmentally friendly.

The Lavender Series also consumes less than 1W of power in the Power Off mode making it more energy efficient than the conventional monitors and is wall mountable.

The 21.5-inch model costs Rs. 12,500 and 23-inch model costs Rs. 13,500.

Google Launches Voice-powered Search

Bullish on the mobile segment, global search engine major Google is strengthening its applications portfolio with the introduction of services like voice-based search and map solutions.

"Mobiles (more than 400 million) outnumber the personal computers (PCs - slightly over 30 million) concentration in India. A big part of the population accessing Internet going ahead would do so on a mobile handset and so we need to offer enriching experience to these users," Google India Head of products Vinay Goel said.

Google has recently launched a free voice-based mobile Internet search application for BlackBerry users. The application has been built by the Internet search giant's India engineering team.

"This feature has been developed by the India team and takes into account the Indian accent. Currently the facility is available only to Blackberry cellphone users in India but we hope to extend this to other handsets by the end of the year," Goel said.

A user can open the Google search page, and ask for a particular location like a pizza joint or taxi stand and the search would show the top results.

With the availability of low-cost GPRS handsets and cheaper data plans, Google expects value-added services like social networking and voice-based Internet search to do well.

BlackBerry to Pay $267 Million to Settle Patent Lawsuit

BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd (RIM) will pay $267.5 million to California-based Visto Corp to settle a patent infringement lawsuit.

Visto, which is a wireless e-mail company, had slapped the lawsuit on RIM in a Texas court for patent infringements in 2006.

In its lawsuit, the US company had said that RIM was using its technology without authorisation. Visto's software is used Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom AG's T-Mobile and Sprint Nextel Corp.

But RIM hit back, saying that Visto's patents involved no new inventions. It also filed its counterclaim, leading to a war of lawsuits between the two companies in the US, Canada and Europe.

But RIM and Visto reached an agreement Thursday, with the BlackBerry maker agreeing to pay $267.5 million to settle the case and use Visto's patents in the future.

"The key terms of the settlement involve RIM receiving a perpetual and fully-paid license on all Visto patents, a transfer of certain Visto intellectual property, a one-time payment by RIM of US $ 267.5 million and the parties executing full and final releases in respect of all outstanding worldwide litigation,'' said a statement by the BlackBerry maker here.

The global wireless giant said the settlement will be completed by July 20, 2009.

This is the second time in three years that RIM has to pay a huge amount to settle a patent dispute with another company.

In 2006, the Waterloo-based Canadian giant had paid a whopping $612.5 million to settle a patent dispute with NTP Inc., a Virginia-based patent-holding company.

It had filed the lawsuit against RIM in 2001, claiming that the BlackBerry maker used its patents without authorization to create the push e-mail platform on its smart phones.

After a five-year legal battle, RIM paid $612.5 million to the American company "in full and final settlement of all claims against RIM, as well as for a perpetual, fully-paid up license going forward.''