Friday of the future: about another Russian smartphone, turning off 3G and important news from Nokia brands

Greetings! MWC Barcelona kicked off this week, so most of the news is natural

turned out to be related to what is shown on it.Well, or not shown at the exhibition itself, but obviously reserved in order to sound during the still most significant congress in the field of mobile communications. Although, if you look at how the industry is developing, the large forums, which everyone tried to get into and where they showed all the latest and greatest, in the future will almost certainly either disappear or significantly lose their significance. The real market leaders have already given up on showing their best achievements, so virtual events in the era of covid lockdowns have become only a reflection of the new reality. About what else this new reality will please - in the next issue of "Friday of the Future".

Table of Contents

• 300 watt smartphone charger
• Nokia changes logo and moves production to Europe
• iSIM instead of eSIM and new features of eSIM in Android
• Xiaomi High Density Batteries
• Samsung and Siemens are building a "smart city" in the US
• China as a leader in the semiconductor industry
• Another Russian Android smartphone
• MTS turns off 3G
• Winamp becomes a streaming service
• AI will replace journalists

300 watt smartphone charger

A couple of years ago, 30-watt smartphone charging wasa very advanced solution that the same Apple did not dare to implement in its smartphones. But Chinese brands have broken up the real race for the fastest charging, so now we can say that the fastest devices in 2023 should be able to charge from 300-watt GaN chargers. Otherwise, this is a “brake”, and not a fast-charging phone. In any case, this is exactly what the prototype from the Redmi brand should demonstrate. The latter, as you know, is used by the mother Xiaomi to work out solutions in which they are not completely sure, but which can be shown to the world without harming themselves in case of failure. And even the demo itself smells of failure, because instead of the declared 300 W, the practical charge level is only 290 W, and such power is not maintained throughout the entire cycle. So the bookworms have already clung to the fact that the theoretical maximum has been passed off as a real solution. And the real solution is so far the Redmi Note 12 Discovery with a battery reduced to 4100 mAh, which was charged in five minutes. In 2 minutes 11 seconds, he got 50% of the maximum capacity. Xiaomi representatives talk about 50 levels of protection when charging, so the battery does not seem to explode from overheating. Another question is that such “shock” loads cannot but affect the battery life, but if public transport and other public spaces were equipped with such ultra-fast charges, there would be much more practical benefit than potential harm to the battery.

Nokia changes logo and moves production to Europe

There are currently two brands on the market.Nokia, and both in the telecom industry, so there is often confusion between the Nokia that is the historical Nokia and the one that is actually the Chinese HMD. But now they will at least be easier to distinguish if there is an official image of the brand somewhere. Of course, in the direction of displaying the rainbow variety, the strict blue color was thrown back by the European Nokia. However, HMD will also soon be no longer just a Chinese company. Because the production of devices with 5G support will be moved to Europe. In this way, the company responds to the increased demand for its models in European markets and reduces its carbon footprint. The process of transferring production actually starts in the third quarter of this year, and there is no information about when it will end. Whether the resettlement will be complete is also not said, it is possible that the “journey” (as the message is officially titled) will be limited to some specific models.

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iSIM instead of eSIM and new features of eSIM in Android

At MWC 2023, representatives from Qualcomm andThales said that the new iSIM technology, which should replace eSIM in the future, has been certified for commercial use. Its practical debut will take place quite soon, it may appear in devices with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset. The difference between the new technology and the already familiar eSIM, which is present in the smartphone as separate electronic components, is that the iSIM is located directly in the processor chip. Thus, manufacturers will free up additional space for the battery, antennas or sensors. And physical SIM cards seem to be ending their life cycle, in 2023 it is expected that devices with eSIM support will add another 15% in sales.

Meanwhile, Google is making it easy to move from onesmartphone to another and migration from a regular SIM to an eSIM using the eSIM Transfer function. Currently, changing a smartphone requires transferring an eSIM profile from one smartphone to another by unregistering the eSIM on the old smartphone and reactivating the registration on the new device. With eSIM Transfer, a direct profile transfer between smartphones is possible without the need to contact your mobile operator for this purpose. Also, the user will have the opportunity to convert physical SIM-cards to eSIM. True, in order for the function to work, the operator’s decision is still required, while eSIM Transfer only supports Deutsche Telecom.

Xiaomi High Density Batteries

Another news that comes from the companyXiaomi, but has nothing to do with the Barcelona congress. The company introduced high-density batteries, which should provide higher energy density, better low-temperature performance and improved safety. Laboratory tests have shown that the developed solid-state batteries have an energy density of more than 1000 Wh/l. Xiaomi claims that these batteries have over 20% higher discharge capacity than traditional batteries at -20°C. Another important advantage of the novelty is their increased security. The use of a solid electrolyte can prevent the penetration of lithium dendrites, which can lead to short circuits. The Xiaomi technical team has also developed a method to make the new batteries more resistant even to needle piercing. The novelty from Xiaomi draws attention to the fact that usually such developments are closer to practical implementation than those created by independent scientific laboratories, but in this case there is not even an approximate timeline for implementation and launch into production.

Samsung and Siemens are building a "smart city" in the US

The concept of smart devices involvesgradual scaling, which should reach the stage when from a couple of gadgets in your pocket and on your hand you can reach the global ecosystem, covering not only the planet, but also the near-Earth space, and even the Moon, where they already plan to create a backup of the data of the entire civilization . But this is in the future, but for now, we have begun to implement the concept of a “smart city” in practice. Samsung, developing its SmartThings system, is working with Siemens on a major housing project in Sterling Ranch, Colorado, USA. One of the objectives of the project is to manage energy resources using SmartThings Energy in order to reduce energy costs and increase household efficiency. The project implements the tasks of producing and storing energy directly in households using solar panels, further energy consumption using smart home appliances, continuous monitoring of energy consumption and its optimization to save consumption, the use of energy efficient solutions in all elements of the household, from household appliances to lighting and heating. It is worth noting that Samsung and Siemens chose not the smallest town for the start-up project - about 12,000 households are involved in the SmartThings Energy system in this project.

China as a leader in the semiconductor industry

The habit of perceiving Chinese R&D departments assomething secondary, occupied rather with reverse engineering, it's time to leave it in the past. The US authorities' ban on Huawei and ZTE gave a huge boost to the development of completely independent development centers in China. And now it is the Chinese developers that dominate the semiconductor solutions market. According to intellectual property law firm Mathys & Squire, the number of semiconductor patents filed by Chinese companies in 2022 represents 55% of all global semiconductor filings. A total of 69,190 applications related to semiconductors were filed last year. China accounted for 37,865 applications. U.S. applications accounted for 26% of the total, with a total of 18,223. The largest patent applicant in this area is Taiwanese TSMC, which accounted for about 7% of total semiconductor patents in 2022. TSMC has 4,793 new patent applications, while IBM has 49 applications and Sandisk has 50. Growing demand for semiconductors and technology competition are driving strong growth in the number of patents, up 9% compared to 2021 .

Another Russian Android smartphone

In Russia, they will again create a domesticsmartphone. And even with the national OS "Aurora". But this is in the future, but for now you will have to use devices on the same Android. And on it, for Russian brands, not everything is clear with the licensing of Google services. However, the batch of up to 100,000 devices promised by the project managers by December of this year hints that the brand will be new, but the principle of OEM production will be old. It is hardly possible to develop a completely new model in such a period, so at least at first, the next Russian smartphone will be a redesign of the Chinese one. The name of the brand, by the way, is not yet known, but its leader and source of funding are indicated. The National Computer Corporation (NCC) of Alexander Kalinin is launching the project, and Vadim Kopin, the founder of Vobis Computer, which produced smartphones under the Highscreen brand, will act as the “developer” of the devices. The plans include a line of budget devices with a price of 10 to 30 thousand rubles and 10% of the Russian market by 2026. If this is a resuscitation of the Highscreen brand, then a transition to ODM should be expected, but NCC already has a bad experience in trying to enter the smartphone market. In 2021, the Aquarius company (part of NCC) and Kaspersky Lab announced plans to develop a secure smartphone on the Aurora OS for government departments. Since then, Kaspersky Lab has withdrawn from the project, and gadgets with Aurora for law enforcement agencies, according to our data, should not be expected earlier than in a couple of years, although delivery of at least 3,000 secure smartphones was expected by the end of 2021.

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MTS turns off 3G

Third-generation networks were never destinedbecome the dominant communications standard. They have become a global, but not the most successful acceleration of mobile data transfer - less reliable than 2G, and losing 4G in speed and quality more than a peasant horse - a steel tractor. However, some networks, including those of Russian operators, still operate in the UMTS standard. But the farther, the less the need to maintain network data, which means that frequency refarming is inevitable, and 3G will be gradually turned off. This week it became known how MTS subscribers will feel it in practice. The operator reported on the acceleration of mobile Internet in 33 regions and plans for the same acceleration in another 14 (including the Moscow region) by the end of the year. For LTE-standard networks, 2100 MHz frequencies are transmitted, which gives greater coverage and better signal penetration compared to 2600 MHz. Previously, in 83 regions, MTS has already transferred a frequency of 1800 MHz for 4G, and from 2025 this operator will completely turn off the UMTS standard. It is by 2025 that MTS expects a mass refusal of subscribers from devices that support 3G, but cannot work in LTE networks.

Winamp becomes a streaming service

I think that many since the 1990s remember the cultthe phrase Winamp, it really whips the llama's ass, which the cult music player for Windows has been delighting with since 1997. But the last update of the player by the original developer was made in 2013, then an update to a completely free version followed in 2018, after which the player did not change in any way, and the Winamp 6 version remained the promise of the Radionomy Group. True, this does not prevent approximately 83 million people from using this application of various versions. The rights to the program and the name from that moment walked from hand to hand until they settled with the Llama Group, which decided to "restart the service." Of course, going strictly in step with the times, so you don't have to puzzle over whether it will be Winamp 6 or Winamp 7 right away. It will just be Winamp, which will turn into a streaming service. Representatives of the Llama Group say a lot that Winamp will allow artists to earn more (up to 85% of royalties), and users to find new items faster and be closer to the performer (some services for contacts "performer-listener" are promised), a million performers ( it is not clear by what date) and an NFT marketplace for content rights management. But more importantly, it is completely unclear whether this new project will have the spirit of Winamp 2.95, which allowed the player to conquer the world, becoming the most popular application for listening to music on PCs throughout the first half of the 2000s. It will be possible to find out quite soon: from March 15, musicians will have access to Winamp, and from April 15, listeners will also have access.

AI will replace journalists

Among the professions in which robots can bemore successful than people, another one appeared. Matthias Döpfner, CEO of publishing group Axel Springer (who owns such publications as Politico, Die Welt and Bild), said that neural networks like ChatGPT could very well replace people in writing news and articles, making the profession of a journalist much rarer than it is now. . Moreover, based on the fact that Matthias Döpfner spoke about this in a letter to employees dedicated to the complete digitalization of Die Welt and Bild publications, his words should not be taken as a statement about some distant future. It may well be that the transformation of Axel Springer into a “purely digital media company” will entail the abandonment not only of paper publications, but also of a significant part of the workers. Moreover, it is precisely the reduction in the cost of printing paper versions that is called the reason for the cessation of the production of traditional Die Welt and Bild, and not concern for the environment and reducing the carbon footprint. However, at a minimum, ChatGPT cannot replace reporters, well-known columnists and special editors, so Mr. Döpfner asked them not to worry. That's when AI can not only confidently determine the right number of fingers, but also reliably distinguish gossip reports from the joke section, and political news from science fiction, then the turn of authors and editors will come. I would advise reporters to take a closer look at AI security cameras, perhaps they are their direct competitors before the end of the decade.

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