Egypt’s Information and Communication Technology Ministry (MCIT) is holding a workshop next Tuesday to make a detailed presentation for the country's coming IT infrastructure projects which include the ICT sector. The anticipant workshop aims to hold a series of introductory seminars on the new projects in the IT infrastructure sector and to invite all the firms working in the ICT sector, notably the prominent global firms such as Oracle, IBM and Microsoft. The ministry will be also inviting some non-governmental organizations such the Chamber of Information Technology and Communication Industry and the Egyptian Information Telecommunications, Electronics & Software Alliance (Eitesal) as well as the private-sector firms working in the ICT field. More»

Fitch Ratings is monitoring the development of Qatar Telecom Q.S.C (Ooredoo 'A+'/Stable) and Emirates Telecommunications Corporation's (Etisalat, 'A+'/Stable) offers to acquire Vivendi SA's (Vivendi, 'BBB'/stable) 53% shareholding in Maroc Telecom Group. We believe that the potential acquisition has no implications on the implied support of or the commitment from the companies' respective governments, which are the main drivers of the two entities ratings. The UAE own 60.03% of Etisalat and the State of Qatar directly and indirectly holds 68% ownership of Ooredoo. Fitch continues to apply its parent and subsidiary rating linkage methodology in rating the two entities. Ooredoo's rating reflects Fitch's assessment of the sovereign's creditworthiness due to Ooredoo's strong operational and strategic ties with the State of Qatar.. This implied state support underpins the strong rating category and offsets risks associated with diversification into weaker rated emerging markets, slowing sector growth and M&A risk. More»

LivingSocial Inc., a daily deal coupons site, said that more than 50 million customers may have been affected by a cyberattack, and the company is working with law enforcement to investigate the matter. LivingSocial is communicating with customers whose data may have been breached, the Washington-based company said in an e- mailed statement today. That includes clients in every country where LivingSocial operates, except South Korea, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines, which use different systems, the company said. Chief Executive Officer Tim O’Shaughnessy sent an e-mail to LivingSocial employees informing them of that attack on its computer systems, which resulted in customer data being compromised. While data that was accessed includes names, e-mail addresses, dates of birth and encrypted passwords, credit-card information was not accessed, O’Shaughnessy wrote. In the e-mail to customers, LivingSocial is recommending that affected users create a new password, and if they use the same password on other sites, to change it accordingly.Source:Bloomberg More»

Axiom Telecom is now selling the HTC One smartphone. Available in both black and silver, HTC’s new flagship device is retailing for AED 2,699 with LTE and 2,499 with 3G. “HTC One has the potential to become a real Android classic,” said Faisal Al Bannai, CEO, Axiom Telecom. “This is a smartphone with a big personality, and the beauty and brains to back it up. From its vivid display and premium build quality to innovations such as the market’s first front-facing stereo speakers and its nuanced take on mobile photography, this is a device that can only ever leave a big impression.” “Having already secured the award for best mobile handset, device or tablet at this year’s GSMA Global Mobile Awards, HTC One has all the style and tech attributes necessary to make a major splash in the UAE,” added Al Bannai. Wrapped in a zero-gap aluminium unibody and featuring the latest Android Jelly Bean operating system enhanced with HTC Sense, the device features ground-breaking new innovations that reinvent the mobile experience and set a new standard for smartphones: HTC BlinkFeed™, HTC UltraPixel Camera with HTC Zoe™ and HTC BoomSound™. More»

Sony Mobile Communications today announced its successful record breaking entry into the Guinness Book of World Records for the world’s largest animated phone mosaic. During the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2013 in Barcelona, Sony Mobile took 196 Xperia ZL smartphones and synched them together to create a 14/14, 6 ft 2 inches display. The Sony Xperia ZL features a Full HD 5-inch touchscreen display with an impressive 443ppi pixel density, using a quad core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro APQ8064 processor clocked at 1.5GHz under the hood. This is paired with 2GB of RAM on the Android 4.1 Jelly Bean operating system. An update to 4.2 Jelly Bean is due to arrive shortly. More»

Etihad Etisalat (Mobily) has signed a strategic agreement with Al-Hayat Real Estate Investments Company in which Mobily becomes the main provider of advanced communications services to Al- Nakhlah Residential City. The agreement was signed in Al-Nakhla Residential City in Riyadh in the presence of Mobily's CBO, Dr. Marwan Al-Ahmadi and Al Hayat's Managing Director, Dr. Abdulrahman Al-Mufarreh. Al-Nakhlah residential city is one of the mega projects located in the north-eastern of Riyadh. It is built on a 315-thousand-square-meter property, which includes more than 1,000 residential units for villas of different sizes and 20 buildings for apartments to provide elegant lifestyle and serenity. The city also includes facilities such as schools, gyms, shopping mall, hospital, and business offices. More»

Six major Vodafone investors said $100 billion was not enough for the British company's stake in its U.S. joint venture with Verizon Communications, and urged the latter to come up with an offer of at least $120 billion. Their comments followed a Reuters report on Wednesday that Verizon had hired advisers to prepare a possible $100 billion bid to buy Vodafone's 45 percent stake in their Verizon Wireless joint venture, likely to be structured as a roughly 50:50 cash and stock bid. Should the $100 billion figure stand, the six shareholders, with around 1.3 billion of Vodafone's shares between them, said they would prefer the British group to push for a full merger with Verizon instead. The main concern among investors contacted by Reuters was the fact that a sale of Verizon Wireless - the best performing asset by far in the Vodafone portfolio - would highlight the operator's exposure to its troubled European markets. More»

Samsung Electronics Co. (005930) posted record earnings as sales of its smartphones surged, widening the company’s global lead as its latest Galaxy handset hits stores to take on Apple Inc. (AAPL) in the U.S. Net income rose 42 percent from a year earlier to 7.15 trillion won ($6.4 billion) in the three months ended March, Samsung said in a statement today. Sales of its smartphones jumped 56 percent to 69.4 million units, almost double the number of iPhones sold by Apple, Strategy Analytics said. Demand for Samsung’s devices, including the flagship Galaxy S4 that went on sale today and cheaper phones targeting emerging markets, are stoking sales in the $358 billion handset market and driving most of the Suwon, South Korea-based company’s profits. Samsung said competition in the market, which is already slowing Apple’s growth, may intensify this year. “It yet again succeeded in taking away some of the smartphone share from Apple,” said Lee Seung Woo, an analyst at IBK Securities Co. “Demand for Galaxy S4 is outstripping its supply.” More»

Twitter Inc. plans to bolster security on its site after the account of the Associated Press news service was hacked and an erroneous post triggered a stock- market decline, according to a person familiar with the matter. Two-step authentication will be introduced to make it harder for outsiders to gain access to an account, said the person, who declined to be identified because the information isn’t public. In addition to a password, the security measure usually requires a code sent as a text message to a user’s mobile phone, or generated on a device or software. Twitter’s defense against hacks involving the theft of passwords came under scrutiny this week after a hacker sent a false post about explosions at the White House, triggering a drop in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index that wiped out $136 billion in market value. The attack came the same month the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said companies can use social-media sites to share market-sensitive news. It also threatened to complicate efforts by Chief Executive Officer Dick Costolo to establish the service as a viable business ahead of a possible initial public offering. “The account that got compromised is the big difference here, as opposed to the traditional impersonating-a-celebrity to say something shocking,” said Wade Williamson, a senior security analyst at Palo Alto Networks Inc. (PANW), a provider of network-protection tools. More»

Samsung Electronics Egypt has filed a complaint to the Investment Ministry and the Customer Protection Agency (CPA) against satellite TV Channels which broadcast misleading advertisements bearing the brand name and the trade mark of the company. Sherif Barakat - Head of Division at Samsung Mobile Egypt – said Samsung has filed a complaint to the Investment Ministry for the withdrawal of satellite channels’ licenses which broadcast the misleading Ads , pointing out that the satellite TV channels don’t make sure from the content published about it, therefore this will make a legal dilemma for many enterprises including Samsung. A number of the Egyptian satellite TV Channels have broadcasted shopping advertisements for costume smartphones such as Galaxy S3 and a number of other devices which affiliated to the company as well as two mobile phone factories. Moreover, Barakat has pointed out that the complaint filed by Samsung recently begins to be interested by the concerned authorities which have sent warnings for those channels, noting that the number of fake Ads on TV Channels declined significantly within the last period. More»