Parmy Olson's Blog, page 60

How Billionaire Carlos Slim Is Pushing Instagram Rival Mobli Onto Millions Of Phones

App developers who like the sound of being automatically downloaded onto tens of thousands of phones at once might want to consider hooking up with Latin America's biggest wireless carrier, America Movil.

Mobile Rewards Network Kiip To Enter Smart TVs and Cars In 2014

Not content with subverting the business of display ads on phones, startup Kiip will start offering digital coupons through connected cars and smart TVs from next year, its founder and CEO told Forbes.

Weebly Launches E-Commerce Tools To Lure Entrepreneurs From Amazon

It's been said that under half the businesses in the United States don't have a presence on the web beyond a quick listing by . Part of the reason is that website hosting can be expensive and complicated. Website builder Weebly, which says it hosts blogs and websites for 20 million people, wants to tackle the problem by appealing to part-time entrepreneurs who'd like an online store, but can't afford the real estate. It's spent the last two years building an e-commerce platform that makes it simple enough to create a free e-commerce site entirely on a smartphone, and in a few minutes.

New CEO: BlackBerry's Turnaround Could Take A Year And A Half

The man announced on Monday as interim CEO of BlackBerry has publicly reiterated his goal of reviving the struggling company's fortunes, and even put a rough timeframe on when he expects to see progress. "I know we have the ingredients to build a long-term sustainable business," John Chen told Reuters, estimating that the turnaround at the Waterloo, Ontario-based company would take about six quarters, or one and a half years.

With More Breathing Room, BlackBerry Could Still Recover

Monday was the deadline for bids for BlackBerry, but rather than announce a full takeover as investors had hoped, the struggling smartphone vendor said it was going it alone and buying more time instead.

With More Breathing Room, BlackBerry Could Still Turn Around

Monday was the deadline for bids for BlackBerry, but rather than announce a full takeover as investors had hoped, the struggling smartphone vendor said it was going it alone and buying more time instead.

How Samsung Is Getting Its Mojo In Silicon Valley

On tree-lined University Avenue in Palo Alto, Calif., where a large sign still denotes a defunct Borders bookstore, a handful of young engineers are funneling cutting-edge software ideas to a technology behemoth in South Korea. You might not know it if you walked past, but this is the Samsung Accelerator, an 11,000-square-foot, open-plan office with many empty desks. "The Big Thing" is painted in large letters on one wall.

Meet The Company That Tracks More Phones Than Google Or Facebook

Picture this scenario. A bored woman sits waiting in an airline lounge. She scrolls through her iPhone and taps on a brightly colored square to launch a free mobile game. In the instant before the app loads something extraordinary happens behind the scenes: an auction for her eyeballs, run by a company you've probably never heard of, called Flurry.

Building A DIY Phone: A Q&A With The Founder Of Phonebloks

Earlier today Motorola went public with a project it had kept under wraps for the last year. The Ara Project to build a modular, DIY smartphone had been so unorthodox that it bordered on the pipe dream. Would consumers ever want a phone with components they could swap out? Wouldn't it look clunky? Wouldn't pricing be a nightmare?

Motorola Unveils DIY Smartphone Project With Phonebloks

Motorola has taken the wraps off Ara, a project to create a smartphone with easily interchangeable parts that could, if successful, revolutionize a device market dominated by and Samsung. The secret sauce? An online community courtesy of the recently-viral Phonebloks.