On the 17th of June Sony Ericsson invited me for their press event in Amsterdam. The day started as usual with a slide show by the head of Sony Ericsson in Benelux. At first he wanted to remind us of the fact that Sony Ericsson has already sold 66.5 million Walkman phones and 22 million Cyber-shot phones. Here some more numbers about Sony Ericsson as a brand;

Continue reading “The newly announced products”

Following the great success of Sony Ericsson’s World View 2007 camera phone competitions with over 70,000 entries, Sony Ericsson recently announced the launch of the new World View 2008 competition, now bigger and better!

The goal of the competition is quite clear; simply snap a “picture perfect” photo, and upload it at the World View 2008 website. I don’t think the website has fully launched yet - at least not here - but it is said to be a stunning, interactive website making it possible to share photos and getting started with social networking.

So… prizes. This year’s prizes are really amazing. The person with the most votes from the people will get The People’s Choice prize, which is a £5,000 (€6,250) trip! If I enter, promise me you’ll vote for me!
The Experts’ Choice winner is chosen by Sony Ericsson’s panel of photography judges, and will be sent on a once-in-a-lifetime trip worth £10,000 (€12,500).

You can read more about the competition in the press release or at the official website once it’s launched.

We’ve had a chat with Kenneth Møller, National Account Manager, Sony Ericsson Denmark and Iceland, about today’s announcements as well as some general phones talk. Here’s what he had to say

Q. The new C905 Cyber-shot features an 8-mega pixel camera - was that a necessary step?

A. The amount of mega pixels is one of many factors we’re continuously working with to get the best image quality. With the C905 you can even share your photos via DLNA to i.e. your TV or Playstation 3 and thereby show the photos in a large size. This is where the amount of mega pixels makes a considerable difference.

Q. An important factor when it comes to mobile phone cameras, high resolutions and alike, is the size of the camera sensor. Any news on this front to avoid picture noise, colour errors, and alike?

A. C905 has a larger camera sensor than what we’ve seen in previous models, but apart from that we’re working on advanced features such as face detection and smart focus, which in different ways is what consumers of compact cameras and mobile phone cameras want.

Q. Many will say the C905 lacks optical zoom. Why was this feature excluded?

A. During the development progress we’re continuously evaluating based on what combination of features that delivers the best user experience and the best combination of features, size and price. In the case of C905, we think the 8.1 MP in combination with the possibility to share your photos on your TV is the best solution. Apart from this you can now also geo-tag your photos with the built-in aGPS and use it for navigation purposes.

Q. The TV-out cable ITC-60 is announced as an accessory to the C905 - can it be used with other phones?

A. C905 is the first phone by Sony Ericsson with TV-out functionality.

Q. The Sony Ericsson F305 is the first model in a revived F-series of gaming phones. Will this series be reserved cheaper phones, or will we also see more expensive phones in this series in the future?

A. We strongly believe in our new F-series, but can only make statements about announced products.

Q. What makes the gaming experience on the F305 unique compared to i.e. the K850 and W910, both also featuring a built-in accelerometer?

A. With an accelerometer as in F305, you get expanded possibilities to use different movements.

Q. With the Cyber-shot phones now in the C-series, will the K-series be used for price-friendly phones such as the K330?

A. The K-series will be used for phones in the entry-level segment. When it comes to imaging, we’ve got the S-series; Snapshot to complement the Cyber-shot range in a more competitive price level.

Q. The C905 in particular has received lots of publicity in the media and on various forums. Is this a so-called hero product?

A. We announce what we think gives the best user experience in the imaging segment. With the C905, we announce several new technologies and applications, that we believe will take the photos from your mobile phone camera to the next level. That’s why we strongly believe the C905 will communicate to all.

Q. What will the new phones cost?

A. It’s not Sony Ericsson without the operators that can set the prices for the markets, and they can vary by market. Our estimate is that the C905 will cost around the same as the K850 did when it was released.

… and now some more general questions.

Q. The XPERIA brand was launched earlier this year, and even since we haven’t seen any further additions in the XPERIA range. Are there any plans of announcing one or more this year?

A. We’ve announced the X1, which will be released during Q4 2008. We can however not comment further on any unannounced products.

Q. How does the future look for high-end phones by Sony Ericsson? At the latest few announcements the primary focus has been on cheap entry-level models - is it the plan to continue this?

A. We’ll be expanding our product portfolio in full to satisfy all kinds of markets.

Q. Is there still a market for ultra-thin phones?

A. The size of the phone is still an important factor, that must be balanced with the feature set and price.

Q. Numerous competitors have announced luxury models - does Sony Ericsson see a future for these phones or are they niche-products?

A. Our goal is to deliver a unique user experience for consumers with different needs. This goes for all segments.

Q. Professional UIQ-phones are a rare sight nowadays - are there any models in the pipeline or is the platform less suitable than Windows Mobile for this kind of phones?

A. Sony Ericsson today works with a set of different platforms that all add different parts to the portfolio. UIQ is still an important platform, complementing Windows Mobile in X1.

PS. Sorry about any mistakes in the text. Had to do this in a hurry, so the translations are definitely not top notch!

These live photos of the black version of the upcoming Sony Ericsson C905 have just been posted at the Arabic Sony Ericsson fan site, SE4M.com. I quite like the look of it, although it seems fairly thick and a bit heavy, at almost 20 millimetres in thickness and 136 grams on the weight scales.

Source: SE4M forums

We told you about the Snapshot series quite some time ago in a post about the new nomenclature of Sony Ericsson phone names, and today we’ll be unveiling Sony Ericsson’s first phone in this series - it’s called the Sony Ericsson S302 Snapshot.

The S302 Snapshot is a cheap camera-enabled quadband GSM phone with further support for EDGE networks. It’ll be available in Europe (S302) and China (S302c).

The S302 Snapshot sports a fair 2 mega pixel camera with fixed focus, meaning your shots won’t get past the snapshot-level, which is basically expectable from a product with that as its surname. It does, however, feature the more advanced camera interface from earlier Sony Ericsson phones, and considering it’s a low/mid-end solution, that’s not half bad. Further more, it’s got a photo light and it features PhotoFix as well, if you decide to use that.
Your favourite moments can be recorded on video, although it won’t be in that great quality, and the internal memory of only 20 megabytes is also somewhat of a hindrance if you had plans about holding your entire photo album on it. It is, however, expandable with a Memory Stick Micro card.

Photos and videos can be easily transfered via either Bluetooth 2.0 or USB 2.0 (notice the 2’s, did you?). If you don’t want to use either, you can post both your images on a blog, or print them directly with the built-in PictBridge support.

Other features worth mentioning are A2DP-support, media player, support for various audio codecs, PlayNow, TrackID, a built-in FM radio and the Access NetFront xHTML web browser.

The S302 Snapshot measures 101 x 46 x 11 (12) millimetres, and weighs a mere 79 grams, making it quite light. Its display is a 2-inch TFT-display with a resolution of 176 x 220 pixels. The battery life is set to 7 hours of talk or 300 hours of standby.

The phone will be available in early Q4 this year, and announced on the 17th. It’ll come in Thunder Grey and Crystal Blue colour trimmings. Its price is yet unknown, but it’ll be quite low.

Press the photos below for the full size ones. This is still prototype software, and the colours have not yet been dealt with, but the quality KICKS ASS, DUDES! I can feel Nokia, LG & Samsung shaking their pants right now. Sony Ericsson is on top, long live the king of mobile photography!

[thanks point0 and Phoner]

Thanks to Phoner at Esato, here’s the demo tour video of the Sony Ericsson C905 Looks awesome!