Global smartphone shipments dropped 6% in Q3 as vendors struggled to meet demand amid a “chipset famine,” Canalys reported Friday. The smartphone industry is straining to maximize device production, while chipmakers bump prices to “disincentivize over-ordering," in an attempt to close the gap between demand and supply, said analyst Ben Stanton, saying shortages won’t ease until “well into 2022.” High global freight costs hiked device pricing at retail, Stanton said. Verizon dropped its $1,000 iPhone offer Thursday, scaling it back to a maximum $500 off, and AT&T’s website Friday showed the $1,000 deal expiring Oct. 14. New Street Research's Jonathan Chaplin wrote that the end of the $1,000 offers put the brakes on a “wireless industry selloff” around subsidies offered with the iPhone 13 launch. The moves may improve T-Mobile’s ability to take share in Q4, said the analyst: The carrier was offering up to $1,000 “on us” Friday via 30 monthly bill credits for customers choosing the Magenta Max plan and trading in an eligible device.

Motorola announced a 6.5-inch mid-tier Android smartphone with a 20:9 aspect ratio, fingerprint unlock, two-day battery life and 13-megapixel camera with phase-detection autofocus. The $159 motog pure, available unlocked and open, will be available for preorder Oct. 14 at Best Buy, Walmart, B&H Photo, Amazon, Motorola.com and Verizon, said the company. Shipping date wasn't given. It will be available to other carriers in coming months.

NPD added the mobile phone category to its U.S. point-of-sale retail tracking service, noting sales through national retailers returned to growth in 2021's first half, after declining in 2019 and 2020, said the company Wednesday. January-to-June cellphone sales rose 2% year over year, down 6% for the first half of 2020 and down 12% for the first half of 2019, it said. “The mobile phone landscape is saturated, and consumers face less choice and fewer reasons to trade up,” said Ian Hamilton, president-tech sector. Growth returned in the first half “due to pent-up demand from the pandemic,” said analyst Brad Akyuz. Further growth is expected “as a result of expanding product and service offerings through new carrier partnerships,” he said.

The FCC reminded industry of upcoming changes in deployment benchmarks for hearing aid-compatible handsets. The benchmark increases from 66% to 85% for handset manufacturers Monday and for large carriers April 4, said a Tuesday notice. The same increase is effective April 3, 2023, for non-Tier I providers, the Wireless Bureau said: "The Commission adopted a schedule for phased increases after finding that the new benchmarks would significantly benefit consumers by expanding access to hearing aid-compatible handsets."

Market leader Sony captured 41% share of the smartphone image sensor business valued at more than $7 billion in global first-half revenue, reported Strategy Analytics Monday. Industry revenue grew more than 10% year over year, it said. The top three vendors -- Sony, Samsung and OmniVision -- had more than 80% share collectively. Introduction of high-resolution and large-format image sensors from major vendors is expected to boost market “revenue opportunities,” said analyst Stephen Entwistle: But “supply fluctuations” of high- and low-pixel image sensors “continue to challenge the growth prospects.”

New Android features that began rolling out this week include accessibility functions that allow users to control smartphone functions with facial gestures, blogged Google Thursday. Camera Switches, within the Android Accessibility Suite, turns a phone’s front-facing camera into a switch, replacing a keyboard, mouse or touch as an input option, said Angana Ghosh, product lead-Gboard. With the Project Activate app, phone owners can use facial gestures and eye movements to activate preset actions such as speaking a short phrase, playing brief audio or sending a text, she said. In the update, the Lookout app gets handwriting recognition to help people with limited vision or blindness: In documents mode, using the phone’s camera, Lookout reads out handwritten and printed text for Latin-based languages, she said. Remote control features are being added to Android phones, allowing Android TV or Google TV users to power on the TV, navigate through recommendations and start a show; users can also type in passwords from the phone’s keyboard for passwords, movie names or search terms, Ghosh said. Android Auto users will be able to launch and listen to music, news and podcasts with personalized recommendations from Google Assistant; they can also play games from GameSnacks while parked, she said.

TCL Mobile’s Flip Pro is available on Verizon Prepaid ($69), and the Alcatel Go Flip 4 is available on T-Mobile ($4 a month for 24 months) and Metro by T-Mobile ($99), TCL emailed Thursday. Both phones are based on the Linux-based KaiOS 3.0 mobile operating system, which can navigate Google apps including Gmail, Maps and Search. An external 1.44-inch display gives users a preview of who’s calling without having to open the phone, said the company. Battery life starts at 14 days on standby.

T-Mobile will offer in-store same-day device repairs at 500 stores across the country starting Nov. 1, with more to follow, said the carrier Thursday. Repairs will be handled by industry-certified experts from Assurant using manufacturer-approved parts, it said. T-Mobile’s Protection 360 plan covers up to five claims per year; plans start at $7 per month and include unlimited screen protector replacement. The carrier said Monday (see 2109130009) it doubled its presence in retail stores with a new Walmart deal, but LightShed Partners analyst Walter Piecyk noted in a Thursday investor email that T-Mobile has indicated Sprint is in over 2,100 Walmart locations, making the increase in overall national retail 6% vs. a doubling. T-Mobile didn't comment.

AT&T asked the FCC to reject an Alarm Industry Communications Committee request to delay AT&T's Feb. 22 3G data sunset, but others backed AICC. Replies were posted through Wednesday in docket 21-304. Only four commenters (see 2109010056) backed AICC, AT&T said. None “offers evidence relevant to AICC’s arguments for the alarm industry, such as the sufficiency of the repeated notices AT&T gave to the alarm companies of its 3G sunset between 2016 and February 2019 (its official 3G sunset announcement), the extent to which those companies have had access to customers’ homes despite the COVID-19 pandemic, and the extent to which alarm companies have been able to obtain the chipsets necessary to upgrade their particular alarm monitoring systems,” AT&T said. AICC said comments show sunset risks outweigh benefits. The record shows “millions of safety related devices depend on the 3G network, besides alarm systems: ‘Ankle bracelet’ monitors to track violent offenders; vehicle collision avoidance systems; vehicle roadside assistance systems; elevator emergency phones; and emergency radios for ‘lone worker’ situations,” the group said. The pandemic “caused significant delays in being able to replace 3G alarm signaling radios in customer premises for more than one year, and the worldwide microchip shortage has compounded the problem considerably,” AICC said. The FCC has “clear legal authority in this matter and the compelling public interest reasons” to consider the petition, said Access Humboldt, the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society, Center for Rural Strategies, Open Technology Institute and Public Knowledge. “There are millions of people affected by the looming shutdown of services besides alarm systems and those services are unquestionably subject to the FCC’s [Communications Act] Title II authority,” the groups said: “Even if AT&T were right about the statutory basis for its services to the alarm industry, that does not deprive the FCC of the ability to consider the public interest harms that would result from the shutdown.”

Managed access systems (MAS) are effective in curbing contraband cellphones in prisons, but other technologies aren’t ready for widespread use, industry commenters responded to an FCC July Further NPRM (see 2107120057). The FNPRM asks “whether other interdiction approaches have become feasible" and CTIA thinks "they have not,” said its filing, posted Tuesday in docket 13-111. Other solutions “remain either problematic for legitimate consumers, technically infeasible, a cybersecurity risk, or they are unavailable” now, the group said. Evolved MAS “builds upon existing MAS technologies to provide more real-time and automated adjustment to changes in the RF environment,” AT&T commented. The systems are “more cost effective to deploy because they can easily be upgraded” and interoperable, AT&T said. T-Mobile said quiet zones, geofencing and network-based solutions and beacon systems aren’t ready. The FCC sought comment on alternatives a year ago, the provider noted: “It now seeks to refresh the record on whether there have been technological, economic, policy, and/or legal developments sufficient to overcome those challenges. There have not.”