Nexus S

..

Update: The original source of the images is now saying these are fake.

What you see above is every telecom exec’s nightmare.  Google is stepping up the mobile phone value chain once again and making its own SIMs.  But it isn’t as drastic as it may seem.

Google Employees in Spain are getting a surprise SIM card with their Nexus S phones these days.  What you see above and below is Google’s own SIM card which allows the ‘sorta search monopolist’ to become a MVNO in Spain.  While Google doesn’t own its own towers or infrastructure (it buys bulk data from the local telecoms – in this case Telefonica, Vodafone, etc.), the move allows Google to control more of the phone experience.  For instance, it can pay one price for bulk data rather than on a per phone basis.  It can also dictate which carriers the phones pull in data from based on quality of service or price.  Roaming internationally can also be controlled and owned as well.

We’ve heard Spain is first but more European locals will start seeing these soon.  MVNOs have gone the way of the Dodo in the US with Sprint buying Virgin and Boost and others departing the market.  Perhaps if these do well for employees in Spain, Google will consider bringing back the MVNO to the US for not only its employees, but also Android customers.

Will the telecoms continue to allow Google to climb up the value-chain like this unabated?  via Spanish forums. More images below, including a picture of a phone on the “Google_Es” Network:

Expand
Expanding
Close

A Peet’s Coffee in San Francisco (what happened to NYC?) is showing a Google Wallet logo beneath its original MasterCard PayPass NFC reader.

It appears that there is minimal upgrade to get Mastercard PayPass systems upgraded to be Google Wallet systems.  In fact, from the merchant standpoint, it may just be upgraded signage.

That’s good news for Google and its rollout plans.  PayPass locations are all over the place and Google wants to hit the ground running.

As of March 2011, more than 92 million MasterCard PayPass cards and devices have been issued for use at approximately 311,000 merchant locations worldwide, including new acceptance environments such as vending, taxis, tollbooths, transit, football/baseball stadiums and golfing events.
In addition to robust deployments at major merchants in the US such as McDonalds, 7-Eleven, CVS, Duane Reade, Sheetz, Hess, Wegmans, The Home Depot, Best Buy, Gulf Oil, Sports Authority, BJ’s, Meijer’s, Whataburger, Tim Horton’s, Shop-Rite, Foot Locker, Sunoco and BP.PayPass has been rolled out in 37 countries. Outside the US, PayPass speeds consumers through the checkout process at  McDonald’s (US, Poland, UK), Burger King (Turkey, UK), 7-Eleven (Australia), Starbucks (Turkey, Malaysia, UK), Petro-Canada (Canada) Tim Horton’s (Canada), Boots (UK), Tesco (UK), Carrefour, Cora and Intermarche (all 3 in France) and in many other types of merchants including supermarkets, cinemas, gas stations, fast food and transit.

Google is expected to release Google Wallet officially today and has created a very amusing ad (if you are a Seinfeld fan), below.
Expand
Expanding
Close

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REsEgrhmMjc]

With the last manned mission to the Space Shuttle, Google announced in a blog post that the company accompanied two Nexus S smartphones to venture into space — for the second time. As seen in the video above, the two devices will remain on the Space Station to help robots perform tasks for astronauts.

A couple of our engineers built an open source sensor logging app that NASA decided was perfect for running diagnostics with the SPHERES. You can download the same app yourself from Android Market. NASA was interested in Android because it’s an open source platform, which makes it easy to customize the software on the phone to meet the specifications required to fly in space and work with the SPHERES. Nexus S was also a good fit because of its various sensors and low-powered, but high-performing, processor. 

NASA chose Android because of its open source platform, which is pretty understandable because for the most part NASA is pretty open. Check out the app if you’re interested.

Sprint is now offering the Nexus S 4G for $99 on a two year contract. The Nexus S 4G packs Android 2.3, 1 GHz Hummingbird processor, NFC technology, 4-inch Super AMOLED touch screen, and 16GB of built in memory — making this arguably Sprint’s best phone. You may also be interested in HTC Evo 4G and HTC Evo Shift 4G, which are also available for $99.

via TechCrunch
Expand
Expanding
Close

While it isn’t officially official, HTC’s CEO Peter Chou has come out and said it would unlock all of its phone’s bootloaders.

Quote from HTC CEO Peter Chou: “There has been overwhelmingly customer feedback that people want access to open bootloaders on HTC phones. I want you to know that we’ve listened. Today, I’m confirming we will no longer be locking the bootloaders on our devices. Thanks for your passion, support and patience.”

It will be interesting to see how the carriers react to this.  The Sprints and T-Mobiles likely will be ok with this (they carry the Nexus S afterall) but Verizon and AT&T?  That’s another story.  GDGT is awaiting clarity on those and other issues.  Expect a Press release from HTC soon.

Expand
Expanding
Close

According to PocketNow, Samsung is gearing up for the US release of AT&T-compatible Google Nexus S. The pearly white model is labeled with the model number GT-I9020A instead of SGH-Ixx7, indicating that the handset will be sold directly through the carrier. The publication nevertheless noted:

It’s still unclear if this will be available directly from AT&T — like the Sprint Nexus S 4G — or strictly from third party retailers, as is the case with the T-Mobile-flavored Nexus.

A version of the Nexus S designed to work with AT&T’s 3G network was first uncloaked this January in an FCC certification document. The Android-driven handset supports AT&T’s 850/1900MHz WCDMA bands, in addition to Bluetooth, single-band 802.11 b/g/n WiFi. It also supports the 13.56MHz band required for the RFID functionality.

Expand
Expanding
Close