COMPANIES

Mashable reported another case of an exploding smartphone involving the Nexus S model. However, it was not a manufacturing defect, but the fault of the owner who opted to use as a spare unit a cheap battery.

The Apple iPhone 6 launch will definitely be one of the most exciting events for the year 2013. Recent reports point to the smart phone’s unveiling in October with the remarkable features of a 1080p Full Retina+ HD and wrap around 3D display.

South Korean tech giant Samsung is going beyond its popular smartphones and tablets. It is foraying into mining. Samsung won a $5.6 billion contract over the Easter weekend to develop Gina Rinehart's Roy Hill iron ore mining project in Western Australia.

Tech Crunch just released an article on Sunday night that claims YouTube, the most popular video sharing site in the world, will close on Monday, April 1. The Web site explained that YouTube started as a competition and the portal is now deciding the winner of that alleged contest as part of the closing down.

Popular blogsite, Tumblr, closed for three hours on Good Friday, March 29, due to networking problems. Tumblr reached a landmark when it reached 100 million blogs hosted and 44.6 billion posts on March 26, 2013, from only 50 million blogs hosted in April 2012.

Step aside, Samsung Galaxy S4, BlackBerry Z10 and iPhone 5S rumours. Facebook is creating noise once more, but not because of another change to its user interface but due to three surprises for the 1 billion members of the world's most popular social networking site.

Techies as well as analysts appear not too impressed with BlackBerry's quarterly report on Thursday, March 28, which disclosed the shipment of 1 million units of the BBZ10 and revenues of $94 million.

And the phablet explosion continues with Amazon likely to be the latest entrant. The online retail giant will soon release its phablet version that new reports said will begin selling by June 2013 at starting price of $US100.

Nothing yet is confirmed about the iPhone 6, not even its existence, but phone designers cannot help to express how they envision the rumoured Apple phablet, which a new render suggests looks like Sony’s Xperia Z.

Apple is reportedly using the same iPad Mini display for the 9.7-inch iPad 5 that would allow the tech giant to build a thinner and lighter regular-sized tablet computer.

South Korean tech giant Samsung could have more legal protection against patent infringement lawsuits in 2013 since it topped the number of mobile patents granted around the world in 2012 when over 7 million such patents were awarded.

A new security feature that was earlier reported to debut with the iPhone 5S will not make it after all on the rumoured June 2013 release of the upcoming Apple smartphone, new reports said.

It appears consumers around the world have taken great notice of LG Optimus G’s high-end features and brisk sales of the flagship handset landed the South Korean firm to the number three spot in terms of global smartphone wholesale revenue.

The U.S. Patent Office granted on Tuesday to Apple a patent for a system that implements multi-touch in a mobile device even if the display is not actively displaying any images, Tech Crunch reported. At the same time it helps save battery life.

We’ll get to see first the second generation Nexus 7 and the Motorola X-Phone, likely the bearer of Google’s Key Lime Pie, prior to the anticipated release of the Nexus 5 smartphone, a new report said.

Move over, 7-inch and 14-inch tablets. Large-screen computing devices are being introduced into the market as Dell rolled out this week its XPS 18 model which features an 18.4-inch touchscreen, while InfoTouch rolled out its 55-inch AiO desktop.

Apple’s iPad 5 and iPad Mini 2 release date is reportedly delayed due to a supplier’s component shortage. Nissha, the main supplier of thin-film touch sensors for the Apple devices, revealed that the lack of production capacity caused the release date be pushed back to Q4 of 2013.

“Blame it on the camera,” is the apparent narrative behind the funky release date for the HTC One, which new reports said will likely take place late April 2013.

U.S. carrier T-Mobile has indicated that Samsung’s Galaxy S4 will hit its distribution channels by May 1 with starting price of $US100 while in the United Kingdom the new Android handset goes on sale beginning April 26.

T-Mobile, the fourth largest cellular network in the U.S., is attempting to change the rules of the game in the telecom industry by ditching the two-year mobile phone contracts. The company introduced on Tuesday a different pricing structure in a bid to regain 500,000 postpaid customers it had lost.

BlackBerry is attempting to regain its lost crown in the smartphone market by even advertising the BB 10 in rival mobile units that operate on competing OS, particularly the iOS and Android.

HTC One is a crucial device carrying the future of its maker and is expected to change tide, refining the design to near perfection. HTC hired the best engineers and put every single effort to create a groundbreaking device to compete with Samsung's Galaxy S4.

Online leaks of the upcoming Windows Blue, the next version of Windows, indicate that it would have features that would make it easier to use both its Metro and Desktop interfaces.

There are three reasons why Blackberry Z10 is better than the iPhone 5 in the area of repairability. ifixit, a tech repair Web site, just gave the BB Z10 an 8 out of 10 score, beating iPhone 5's 7.

It looks like budget phones will create a considerable scene this year and Nokia will not be left behind as the Finnish mobile device maker is all set for the global rollout of the Nokia Lumia 520, which is the Lumia 521 for U.S. buyers.

Sony’s latest gaming console, the PlayStation 4, will soon deliver its promised high-level and new entertainment environment but the box it will replace remains a must-buy and with the release of new titles plus more in the pipeline, a PlayStation 3 purchase today has never been more compelling.

The testing for Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean has began, and devices from 4.0 ICS going to Jelly Bean under the Galaxy tab 2 line up should received their updates in September 2013 if nothing goes wrong with the performance testing.

Canon announced the availability in Australia of the PowerShot SX280 HS that features the brand's proprietary High Sensitivity (HS) system known for providing good performance despite low light.

The powerful 1.5GHz dual core, 1GB RAM, sharper display, and superior speakers of the Kobo Arc Tablet that won praise from reviews finally runs Android 4.1 Jelly Bean OS.