congress

Spotify finally finds an automotive home

BARCELONA, Spain--Internet music service Spotify gained more than 10 million users in Europe before its U.S. launch in July of 2011. But despite all the fanfare, no automotive integration had been announced. That all changed today as Ford welcomed Spotify integration into its Sync AppLink stable.

Spotify joins automotive standard Pandora, along with music apps Slacker, Mog, Rhapsody, TuneIn, IHeartRadio, and the Amazon Cloud Player among music apps integrated with Ford's Sync AppLink feature. AppLink gives drivers control over app on their smartphones using the car's interface, including voice command.

For Sync AppLink integration, apps must be … Read more

How MasterCard plans to transform mobile purchases

BARCELONA, Spain--The hype around mobile payments is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the coming transformation for how people purchase goods and services.

That's according to Ed McLaughlin, chief emerging payments officer for MasterCard, who spoke with CNET about his company's vision.

While at the Mobile World Congress conference, MasterCard unveiled its MasterPass system, which addresses not only mobile payments, but also all forms of digital transactions. MasterPass is designed for purchases made in stores, online, or on the phone.

"It's a foundation for moving to a world beyond plastic," McLaughlin … Read more

Intel talks new chips, partners at Mobile World Congress

A year ago, Intel's CEO took the stage at Mobile World Congress to tout new partnerships and talk up the benefits of Intel's mobile chips.

At that time, the Santa Clara, Calif., semiconductor maker's presence in the smartphone market was essentially nonexistent. Today, Intel has 10 phones shipping in 20 countries (though not the U.S.), and it keeps improving its power consumption and performance.

While that's good progress, Intel still has a long way to go, as the company readily admits. It hopes the new chips it's officially launching today at MWC 2013 will … Read more

AT&T, General Motors to sell 4G LTE-connected cars next year

BARCELONA, Spain--General Motors cars rocking their own 4G LTE connection will hit the road next year.

AT&T and GM's OnStar service unit struck a deal to bring millions of connected cars to the market, starting with the 2015 fleet, which comes out late 2014. GM said most Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, and Cadillac cars will get wireless connections.

It's the latest win for AT&T, which has been particularly aggressive in going after the connected car business, a lucrative one in which the company believes it can eventually generate a billion dollars in revenue. Furthermore, the … Read more

Samsung confirms Galaxy S4 to launch March 14

BARCELONA, Spain--Samsung Electronics will unveil its next flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S4, on March 14, CNET has confirmed.

Samsung is set to send out invitations this morning to a "Samsung Unpacked" event in New York for next month, CNET has learned. While the invitation contained little details, CNET has confirmed with a high-level executive that the Galaxy S4 will make its debut there.

After the blockbuster success of the Galaxy S3, anticipation has surged for the successor to the Galaxy S franchise. The Galaxy S3 last year emerged as a true rival to Apple's iPhone, even seeing … Read more

Samsung amps up business push with Knox security software

BARCELONA, Spain--Samsung Electronics is getting serious about attacking the business world.

The South Korean consumer electronics giant unveiled Knox, an additional layer of security software that will run as part of its SAFE (Samsung for Enterprise) initiative. Samsung is considering embedding Knox into Samsung's next flagship smartphone, YH Lee, executive vice president of Samsung Mobile, told CNET.

Samsung considers the business world to be its next avenue of growth, and has already positioned its ads to emphasize the security and enterprise-ready aspects of its products. In doing so, Samsung is going after a business long dominated by BlackBerry, and … Read more

Samsung to launch first Tizen smartphone as early as July

BARCELONA, Spain--Samsung Electronics expects to release its first smartphone running on the Tizen mobile operating system in July or August, CNET has learned.

The Tizen Association is scheduled to make the official announcement later this week at Mobile World Congress.

Tizen is an upstart operating system seen as an alternative to the stranglehold that Google's Android and Apple's iOS has on the smartphone industry. Samsung and Intel have been spearheading the development of the mobile OS, and Japan's NTT Docomo has already committed to carry the phones.

Tizen is just one of many emerging mobile operating system … Read more

Global allies give Mozilla's Firefox OS a mobile foothold

BARCELONA, Spain--Laying the groundwork for its nascent Firefox OS, Mozilla has won over a sizeable list of allies including LG Electronics and China Unicom, and the first phones with the browser-based operating system should arrive in the second quarter of the year.

Mozilla announced today at the Mobile World Congress show here that it's persuaded 18 mobile network operators and four mobile phone makers to back its open-source mobile operating system. That's not enough to unseat the incumbent powers of Google's Android and Apple's iOS slayer, but it is enough to ensure Firefox OS at least … Read more

ZTE at MWC 2013: Join us Monday (live blog)

BARCELONA, Spain--Get all the details of ZTE's Mobile World Congress press conference right here.

CNET's Brian Bennett, photographer Stephen Shankland, and I will be bringing you the news, photos, and commentary from the event, which begins at 7 a.m. PT on Monday.

ZTE is expected to build upon its expanded presence at last year's show and go big with the smartphone announcements. The company has in the past unveiled phones here that don't make it to the U.S., although it has made progress in its relationships with the U.S. carriers.

You can tune … Read more