Samsung has exceeded its target for mobile phone sales in 2009, with the electronics giant breaking its self-imposed 200 million handset goal.

Samsung is the second biggest seller in the mobile phone world, and after narrowly missing out on the 200 million mark in 2008, it was confident of breaking it this year.

And that confidence was not misplaced, with the company now stating that it has surpassed its target, in a big year for the mobile phone.

Marginal cuts?

Some analysts have immediately suggested that the company may need to cut its margins in order to compete in the growing smartphone market, but the company will be delighted about the growth it has shown in touchscreen handsets.

Samsung also stated that its global market share in handsets rose over 20 percent for the first time in the third quarter, and with an unchanged profit margin of 10 per cent.

The likes of Apple, RIM and old hands like Sony Ericsson and Nokia have all seen smartphone sales increase, as the market becomes steadily more competitive.

Discover Financial Services today announced the launch of a Discover App for iPhone and iPod touch on the App Store. The app will allow cardmembers to manage their accounts directly from their iPhone or iPod Touch. Once the app is opened, Discover.com registered users can login by entering their user ID and password. The login page also provides users with the ability to contact customer service, learn more about Discover or connect with Discover via social media.

Once logged in, the app offers Discover.com account access and provides a variety of functionality, including the ability to view recent activity, make a payment and view rewards detail.

“The account management features of the new app, such as making a payment and checking a balance, are easy and convenient for managing finances on the go,” said Mike Boush, vice president of E-Business at Discover. “But beyond that, our cardmembers see the Discover logo at millions of merchant locations across the country every day, and now they can see the rewards they’re earning in the palm of their hand.”

The Discover App is available for free from the App Store on iPhone and iPod Touch or at www.itunes.com/appstore.

The app is the most recent offering through Discover Mobile, Discover’s platform that gives cardmembers easy-to-use account management via mobile devices. Last year, the company launched m.discover.com, a phone-browser optimized version of the Discover.com Web site. Discover Mobile Reminders, which provide notifications about Discover account activity via text messages, launched in May.

As UQ Communications’ primary Mobile WiMAX equipment vendor, Samsung has already successfully deployed Mobile WiMAX networks in the major metropolitan centers of Tokyo, Nagoya, and Osaka. UQ Communications launched commercial Mobile WiMAX service in July 2009. Based on its strong partnership with UQ Communications Inc, Samsung was awarded additional supply contracts for Mobile WiMAX base stations for delivery early next year.

Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., a leading provider of telecommunication systems and mobile phones, today announced that it has won additional mobile WiMAX supply contracts from UQ Communications Inc., the Japan-based Mobile WiMAX service provider. Further expanding its industry presence in Asia, Samsung also announced it has joined the WiMAX Centre of Excellence, which is led by YTL Communications, the Malaysian Mobile WiMAX service provider.

As UQ Communications’ primary Mobile WiMAX equipment vendor, Samsung has already successfully deployed Mobile WiMAX networks in the major metropolitan centers of Tokyo, Nagoya, and Osaka. UQ Communications launched commercial Mobile WiMAX service in July 2009. Based on its strong partnership with UQ Communications Inc, Samsung was awarded additional supply contracts for Mobile WiMAX base stations for delivery early next year.

UQ Communications is invested by six independent companies in Japan, including KDDI Corporation, Japan’s second largest mobile service provider, Intel Capital Corporation, East Japan Railway Company, KYOCERA Corporation and others.

UQ Communications Inc obtained its license for mobile WiMAX service from Japan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications in December 2007.

Continuing its leadership in the industry, Samsung also announced that it joined the WiMAX Innovation Network in Malaysia, led by YTL Communications. Other global companies in the WiMAX industry such as Clearwire, Cisco, and GCT Semiconductor also participate in the program.

The WiMAX Innovation Network encourages and supports the development of Mobile WiMAX applications and products, and has been created to build a “WiMAX Centre of Excellence” in Kuala Lumpur.

Samsung will take the role of knowledge provider and technical assistant, providing its interoperability test lab in Malaysia for approved developers.

YTL Communications is preparing to launch commercial Mobile WiMAX services, providing a high-quality, converged mobile 4G network all over the country by late 2010.

For this, Samsung will provide a comprehensive WiMAX network solution including mobile WiMAX base stations, end-to-end IP Multimedia Service (IMS) solutions, and a range of Mobile Internet Devices (MID).

Sprint Nextel has widened its loss by 47 percent to $478 million, or 17 cents per share, in the third quarter from a loss of $326 million, or 11 cents per share, in the year ago period. The company posted revenue of $8.0 billion, down 9 percent since the same period last year.

The company lost 801,000 post-paid subscribers and churn increased to 2.17 percent from 2.15 percent in the year ago period. Sprint’s ARPU stayed flat at $56 and says that it has stayed stable because of its flat-rate bundled plans.

Sprint forecasts that subscriber losses should improve this year and noted that it achieved its best net retail subscriber results in more than two years.

Rumors have been circulating of Telus picking up the iPhone for some time now but we haven’t had official confirmation from the carrier as to when we will see the device. Luckily, they have announced that they will be offering the iPhone on November 5th of this year.

You’ll be able to pick the iPhone 3G for $99.99, the 16GB 3GS for $199.99 and the 32GB 3GS for $299.99 on 3-year contracts.

Additionally, Telus will be picking up the HTC Hero and the LG New Chocolate at some point after the iPhone is released.

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU), aka the telecomm branch of the United Nations, has recently approved a standard for a universal phone charger. The standard is based on the GSM Association’s earlier suggestion for a Micro-USB-based universal mobile phone charger.

This is really good news for anyone who has been following the ‘universal phone charger‘ story. The ITU joins the GSMA and the CTIA, which jumped on board earlier this month, in making a universal mobile phone charger that much closer to becoming a reality. Hooray for cooperation!

According to the ITU:

Every mobile phone user will benefit from the new Universal Charging Solution (UCS), which enables the same charger to be used for all future handsets, regardless of make and model. In addition to dramatically cutting the number of chargers produced, shipped and subsequently discarded as new models become available, the new standard will mean users worldwide will be able to charge their mobiles anywhere from any available charger, while also reducing the energy consumed while charging.

Not only will the new universal charger be more convenient and save consumers (some) cash, but they are also more environmentally friendly. Malcolm Johnson, Director of ITU’s Telecommunication Standardization Bureau (TSB), said: “This is a significant step in reducing the environmental impact of mobile charging, which also has the benefit of making mobile phone use more straightforward.” The new, universal chargers are based on the Micro-USB interface, and will include a 4-star or higher efficiency rating – up to three times more energy-efficient than an unrated charger.

Just as promised, Sony Ericsson revealed their financial report for Q3 2009 today. Things are still looking pretty gloomy for the company, continuing to lose money, but at least the numbers are better this time around (compared to the previous quarter).

The company has managed to ship 14.1 million handsets, which according to the company analysts, accounts for 5% market share. This is a 0.3 million increase over Q2, but still 11.6 million lower than Q3 2008.

The operating income of the company is in fact a loss of 193 million euro. While this by itself is pretty bad it shows sings of improvement over the 274 million euro loss in Q2 2009.

The average selling price of the Sony Ericsson handsets has dropped to 114 euro, from 122 euro in Q2. However this is still higher than the 109 euro ASP recorded in Q3 of 2008.

The hopes of the troubled company for survival depend on the cost-cutting programs started since mid-2008, which should reduce annual operating expenses by 880 million euro. The effect of those programs however will be felt in the second half of 2010.

In shorter terms we expect the market release sales of the Satio, Aino and Yari to have a positive effect on the company’s result for the last quarter of the year. An announcement of the XPERIA X3 would also most probably benefit the profit quite a bit.

For more details and numbers you can find the full report here.

Late last night, around midnight if you really must know, the ATSC (aka the Advanced Television Systems Committee) ratified the A/153 ATSC Mobile DTV Standard which “defines the technical specifications necessary for broadcasters to provide new services to mobile and handheld devices using their digital television (DTV) transmissions.”

In other words, digital TV will soon be playing on mobile handsets all across the U.S. of A.

More specifically:

The new services for mobile and handheld devices are carried along with current DTV services without any adverse impact on legacy receiving equipment. ATSC Mobile DTV was developed to support a variety of services including free (advertiser-supported) television and interactive services delivered in real-time, subscription-based TV, and file-based content download for playback at a later time. The standard can also be used for transmission of new data broadcasting services.

This is sort of a bittersweet moment for me. TV watching has heretofore always been a specific location-based activity, i.e. your family room, a sports pub, a friend’s house, etc. Thus, if you wanted to watch the boob tube, you simply found your way to one of these spots. If you weren’t in the mood for some tele, you could just go for a walk in the park, take a drive around the town, or curl up with a book in a different room.

However, now that the new mobile digital TV standard will “enable broadcasters to provide new compelling services to consumers utilizing a wide array of wireless receiving devices including mobile phones, small handheld DTVs, laptop computers and in-vehicle entertainment systems” there really won’t be anywhere left to hide, er avoid watching TV.

But I guess it’s not all bad news. There are plenty of times when firing up a “mobile TV” will be wonderfully convenient, such as watching live sports with the sound muted during a terrible business presentation or during your kid’s elementary school musical, for example. Not to mention, the new mobile DTV also features “enhanced” content:

In addition to live television, the new ATSC Mobile DTV standard provides a flexible application framework to enable new receiver capabilities. Receivers that make use of an optional Internet connection will enable new interactive television services, ranging from audience measurement and simple viewer voting to the integration of Internet-based applications and transactions with television content.

In the end, with more and more large screen mobile devices hitting the market (come on, HTC Dragon!), along with the announced support from the Open Mobile Video Coalition, a voluntary association of more than 800 broadcast stations across the country, access to mobile DTV could actually be pretty sweet…under the right circumstances.

This article contains unofficial information.

Just when you though the marriage of T-Mobile and Sprint were to happen some time down the road, Deutsche Telekom’s CFO has made a comment that might have put an end to the speculations. Recent reports have hinted T-Mobile’s parent company, Deutsche Telekom, was in the works of acquiring Sprint – possibly merging the number three and four carriers in the US. Timotheus Hoettges, Deutsche Telekom CFO, made a comment at how competitive the US mobile market is currently and that a point has been reached with the four big carriers. It’s not like he mentioned that there would be no major headway between the rankings of the major domestic carriers, but a comparison to the current status of the European mobile phone market made it sound like it. Hoettges stated in a conference call in Frankfurt that “There are four national players in the U.S. market for 300 million households, while in Europe, where we have 350 million households, there are 50-70 operators. We believe in our chances of being the challenger.” So for now it looks like everyone is staying put.

via GigaOM