Gartner this week predicted a 1 percent contraction in global shipments of all types of devices this year, according to Computerworld. This is a sharp turnabout from a quarter ago, when the firm said growth would increase 1.5 percent compared to 2014.
Even so, some markets will still see growth. The firm said that smartphone shipments will increase 14 percent this year compared to a year ago, but laptop shipments will fall 7.3 percent. Tablets will sink 13 percent because users with 7-inch and 8-inch screens are replacing their devices less frequently than in the past.
São Paulo Elicits Mobility Ideas
The city of São Paulo is sponsoring mobility projects and is encouraging entrepreneurs, small to midsize enterprises and others to submit ideas.
ZDNet says that ideas will go to the Department of Transportation’s Mobility Lab, with open source projects being placed into the fast lane. Winners will get $12,500 to $50,347 to work on projects over periods ranging from 6 to 24 months.
The city had previously undertaken a range of technology-based projects aimed at enhancing public transportation. Even so, São Paulo has been nicknamed the city of “20 million traffic jams,” due to the quickly rising rate of automobile ownership.
Unlocking Plot Against AT&T
According to NetworkWorld, three AT&T employees installed software for unlocking cellphones that enabled hundreds of thousands of requests for phone unlocking to be secretly sent to its servers, according to a complaint made in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington.
Two companies, four people and an unknown developer were named in the suit, which was brought on September 11. It alleged that the company discovered misuse of Torch, the software used to unlock cellphones:
Upon investigation, the company discovered that the logins and passwords of two employees at a center in Washington were responsible for a large number of the requests and those requests happened within milliseconds of each other.
The accused employees are Kyra Evans and Marc Sapatin. In unrelated news, AT&T is also the victim of vandals who are cutting its fiber cables in California.
IBM Watson Expands
InformationWeek reports that IBM is opening a hub in San Francisco for its Watson cloud-based, cognitive computing system. At that location, the company will seek to further integrate Watson with its commerce portfolio of retailers and consumer products companies.
As you may remember, Watson’s fast rise started as one API—the one that famously beat Ken Jennings on Jeopardy! in 2001—and “a limited set of application-specific Q&A capabilities.” It now has more than 25 APIs that use more than 50 technologies.
IoT Important to IT Execs or Not
Datamation looks at one survey that shows that IT executives are down with the IoT, but another study’s results are more ambivalent.
The bullish survey is from IDC. It found that 73 percent of 2,350 IT enterprise decision makers already have or are planning to deploy IoT technology within the next year. That finding, Datamation points out, contradicts an earlier survey by TechValidate and Red Hat that found that only 12 percent of respondents are rolling out the platform.
The IDC survey looked at verticals. Health care led, with 72 percent of respondents saying that IoT is a strategic initiative. IT pros in the transportation (67 percent) and manufacturing (66 percent) sectors also see the IoT as key.
Carl Weinschenk covers telecom for IT Business Edge. He writes about wireless technology, disaster recovery/business continuity, cellular services, the Internet of Things, machine-to-machine communications and other emerging technologies and platforms. He also covers net neutrality and related regulatory issues. Weinschenk has written about the phone companies, cable operators and related companies for decades and is senior editor of Broadband Technology Report. He can be reached at cweinsch@optonline.net and via twitter at @DailyMusicBrk.