Amazon is continuing its price-cutting attack with its Fire franchise as the holiday season officially kicks in. After enticing Prime customers with a $19 deal for the $39 Fire TV Stick, it whacked the investment in a Fire Phone to $199 unlocked, after launching it in June for $649 unlocked, or $199 with a two-year AT&T contract. In the Kindle line, Amazon is offering a limited-time deal on the 6-inch e-reader, cutting the price from $139 to $99, including six months of “unlimited reading.” Amazon’s vault of Amazon Unlimited content -- 700,000 books and audio books -- is available to members for $9.99 per month.
Consumer sentiment toward the overall economy slipped 1.2 points in November but is above that of last year, said a CEA report released Tuesday. Consumer expectations about technology spending, meanwhile, climbed 7.3 percentage points in November, 1.6 points above the year-ago period, CEA said. “Consumers appear to have held off slightly on tech purchases in October in preparation for holiday shopping, including Black Friday,” said Shawn DuBravac, CEA chief economist. For the holiday period, the association is forecasting 2.5 percent growth in tech spending, compared with 0.9 percent growth for the period in 2013, to reach a record $33.76 billion.
Samsung Ventures, which manages investments for Samsung’s various mobile and CE subsidiaries, bought an undisclosed stake in DocuSign, which bills itself as the "global standard for digital transaction management." Samsung’s investment, terms of which weren't released, "opens the opportunity to bring DocuSign closer to mobile users" for securely transacting "anything, anytime, anywhere, on any device," the companies said in an announcement last week. They called the investment "a precursor to the development of a broader strategic relationship" between the companies.
T-Mobile is adding 14 streaming services to its Music Freedom program, including Google Play Music, SoundCloud and Xbox Music, the carrier said Monday. Other services will serve specific music genres, including Bollywood, Caribbean and jazz, it said. The carrier already supported 13 streaming services through the Music Freedom program, including Pandora and Rhapsody. T-Mobile subscribers can stream music through the Music Freedom program without incurring data charges, the carrier said. The number of T-Mobile customers who are streaming music has risen almost 300 percent since the Music Freedom program began over the summer, the carrier said.
Linn is offering a Christmas gift to audiophiles, giving away a free, unique 24-bit Studio Master track from its download store every day in December until Christmas Eve. The company will also post a new video each day with the story behind every song, it said. Typical prices for Linn music downloads are $12.50 for a 320k MP3 and $18 for a 24-bit FLAC file.
The International Council of Shopping Centers canvassed consumers on their holiday weekend shopping ambitions and found 41 percent plan to head to the stores on Black Friday, 18 percent will do so Thanksgiving Day, and a third will wait to shop physical stores Saturday or Sunday, the trade group said Monday. It also found that Cyber Monday won’t be exclusively for online shopping, as nearly four in every 10 consumers plan to go to a physical store that day, the group said. Of those who plan to shop in-store on Thanksgiving Day, half said they would do so to get a jump on bargains, it said. However, 45 percent said they see a Thanksgiving Day shopping experience as "an opportunity for a fun outing with family and friends," it said. The survey also found that 45 percent of shoppers expect to use a smartphone or tablet to research holiday-related items or gifts while in a physical store, it said. As for the allure of shopping a physical store rather than an e-commerce site, the need to "touch and feel the product," or the desire for "instant gratification" without having to wait for shipping were among the top reasons cited, it said.
The United Airlines app for accessing in-flight movies and TV shows for free on the airline’s personal device entertainment servers is now available on Android devices, the airline said Friday. United launched a beta version of the app earlier this year for laptops and Apple devices. Content stored on on-board servers is available on nearly 200 United aircraft, the company said. In 2015, United will expand the service to "hundreds" of additional aircraft, it said.
An increase in safety features for driver monitoring is spurring demand for multifunction TFT-LCD panels used in the automotive instrument cluster, said a DisplaySearch report. Shipments of TFT-LCD panels for the instrument cluster are expected to grow 48 percent this year to 30.2 million units, rising to 50 million units in 2018, DisplaySearch said. Safety functions such as “emergency stop” and “active lane control,” once features “found only in science fiction,” are now becoming more commonplace, said Hiroshi Hayase, DisplaySearch vice president-small/medium displays. With fully automatic driving on the horizon, and with growing requirements for monitoring safety and other functions, TFT-LCD instrument clusters “could soon resemble glass cockpits,” Hayase said. Growing manufacturer demand for automotive TFT-LCD panels in the instrument cluster are led by the U.S., Europe, Japan and other developed nations, he said. In the first half of 2014, Europe's Continental was the top buyer of instrument cluster TFT-LC panels, followed by Ford and Nippon Seiki, Hayase said.
Lowe’s is offering a smart water shut-off valve for its Iris smart home technology that can be controlled over the Internet in case of a leak, the retailer said Monday. The $159 valve links to water and temperature sensors and will automatically shut off the water supply if a leak is detected or if the temperature falls to a level that could cause pipes to freeze, it said. Water damage and pipe freezing account for 22 percent of all homeowner insurance claims, with an average cost exceeding $7,000, Lowe’s said, citing the 2014 Insurance Fact Book from the Insurance Information Institute. Preventive technologies such as the smart valve can “significantly reduce the risk of water damage to one’s home from undetected leaks,” which can help minimize damage, said Michael Robon, senior-vice president, Liberty Mutual. “Customers who use devices like these to proactively protect their homes should be rewarded for this behavior,” he said. Liberty Mutual discounts will be offered in several states for consumers who own water mitigation devices, a Lowe’s spokeswoman told us, but further details weren’t available.
Bingham McCutchen and Morgan Lewis are combining, the law firms said Monday. The deal includes 226 partners and 525 other lawyers and staff from Bingham, said Morgan Lewis in a news release. It said "Morgan Lewis gains new or expanded capabilities by welcoming top-tier lawyers who counsel clients in areas including telecommunications," intellectual property and antitrust. All of Bingham's Telecom, Media & Technology (TMT) group will continue at Morgan Lewis, said an email from Bingham TMT lawyers Andy Lipman and Catherine Wang.