According to the Journal, Google will sell all those Nexus devices directly to users through its new Google Play Device Store. It’ll supposedly offer direct sales to users in the U.S., Europe, and Asia; it might even partner up with some retailers to expand the program.

With that step, everything that’s happened lately — the talk of a Google-branded tablet, the launch of a carrier-free Google Nexus store — suddenly all makes sense. It all leads up to this. This is how Google is taking back control of Android: It’s doing it in a very Googley way. In this model, everyone can still customize and modify the platform all they want, but Google will have its own inner circle of premium devices with pure and premium experiences. From hardware to software and carrier control, this army of Nexus devices could finally deliver the full “Google experience” — the experience that Google has long wanted to provide.

By JR Raphael, CW

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Tablets are expected to outsell laptops in 2016 as tablet shipments quintuple from 81.6 million in 2011 to 424.9 million by 2017, according to research firm DisplaySearch.

Note that tablet dominance doesn’t mean iPad dominance. Apple’s market share will shrink from its current 68%, dropping below 50% by 2017, according to the NPD Group. Nevertheless, Forrester predicts that Apple will continue to lead in the enterprise and among premium buyers worldwide. Tablets based on Google’s Android platform will capture the low end. Microsoft Windows 8 tablets, expected to reach stores by the end of the year, will become a strong competitor in 2014.

While laptops will no longer be the center of the personal computing universe, they won’t disappear for a long time. The transition to tablets will take years, and meanwhile laptops will be used for graphic- and processing-intensive tasks such as graphic design, engineering and complex calculation. But as tablets become better-suited to a wide range of tasks, and the support technologies become more widespread, most people will find them simpler and more convenient. Then, Forrester says, even die-hard laptop lovers will ditch their notebooks and jump on the tablet juggernaut.

By Antone Gonsalves, ReadWriteMobile

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Ironically, it’s a tablet from a company resolutely anti-stylus that has brought the pen back into vogue. Steve Jobs’ stance on styli was clear, but there’s a growing cadre of apps and users who are turning back to the extra precision and task-specific usability that a pen can deliver. Software like Taposé, mimicking the Courier experience as best it can without an active digitizer, as well as Paper and various graphics apps from big names like Adobe have all sent iPad owners scuttling to find the best of what is, boiled down, a compromise: a faux-fingertip on a stick.

Evernote has been pretty specific about what is planned for Penultimate. The app will stay an independent download – $0.99 for the iPad from the App Store – but gain search and sync support with Evernote accounts. Meanwhile its creator, Ben Zotto, will join the Evernote team and “lead the effort” to integrate handwriting and digital ink support into future versions of the main product itself.

If the rise of capacitive stylii and, perhaps on a smaller scale, the Galaxy Note have shown us, it’s that users often need a helping hand to recognize exactly what they can achieve with new tools. Evernote and Penultimate look to be leading that next charge, and it could be just the shove that puts the stylus back into the limelight.

By Chris Davies, SlashGear – For full details, please click here

Penultimate, which costs $0.99, will remain a separate application “and will get many much-requested Evernote-y improvements including full search and synchronization.” Apple lists Penultimate as its #4 most-downloaded paid iPad app.

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Overall, 79 percent of respondents in a survey conducted in the first quarter said they had shopped using their smartphone or tablet. But when it came time to buy, 42 percent of tablet owners said they bought purchased items on their device compared to 29 percent of smartphone owners.

For things like finding a store (73 percent of smartphone owners versus 42 percent of tablet owners), using shopping lists (42 percent v. 16 percent for tablets) and mobile coupons (32 percent v. 11 percent) there’s a clear preference for smartphones.

For price-checking, the smartphone has a smaller edge (62 percent v. 52 percent for tablets) while both devices are good for research before a purchase, with people preferring the tablet 66 percent over the smartphone 57 percent.

As a payment tool, both devices are still finding their way. Nielsen said that 28 percent of tablet owners and 27 percent of smartphone users have used their devices for payment.

By Ryan Kim, GigaOM

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Nokia has been the global market leader in total mobile phone shipments since the inception of IDC’s Mobile Phone Tracker in 2004. Samsung’s ascension to the market’s top spot is largely a reflection of its gains in the smartphone market over the past two years. “The halcyon days of rapid growth in the smartphone market have been good to Samsung,” said Kevin Restivo, senior research analyst with IDC’s Worldwide Mobile Phone Tracker program. “Samsung has used its established relationships with carriers in a mix of economically diverse markets to gain share organically and at the expense of former high fliers such as Nokia.”

Meanwhile, the worldwide smartphone market grew 42.5% year over year in 1Q12, as Samsung overtook Apple for the smartphone leadership position. Vendors shipped 144.9 million smartphones in 1Q12 compared to 101.7 million units in 1Q11. The 42.5% year-over-year growth was 1% higher than IDC’s forecast of 41.5% for the quarter, and lower than the 57.4% growth in the fourth quarter of 2011.

“The race between Apple and Samsung remained tight during the quarter, even as both companies posted growth in key areas,” said Ramon Llamas, senior research analyst with IDC’s Mobile Phone Technology and Trends program. “Apple launched its popular iPhone 4S in additional key markets, most notably in China, and Samsung experienced continued success from its Galaxy Note smartphone/tablet and other Galaxy smartphones. With other companies in the midst of major strategic transitions, the contest between Apple and Samsung will bear close observation as hotly-anticipated new models are launched.”

Smartphone Vendor Highlights

Samsung reclaimed the smartphone leadership position and established a new market record for the number of smartphones shipped in a single quarter. Propelling the company forward was continued expansion of its Galaxy portfolio in nearly all directions – new and old smartphones, product and market segmentation, and multiple price points, screen sizes, and processor speeds.

Apple slipped to second place in the worldwide smartphone market, but nonetheless posted strong year-over-year growth to reach 35.1 million units shipped. Apple’s gains in the market benefited from iPhone availability at additional mobile operators worldwide, as well as sustained end-user demand among both consumers and enterprise users.

Nokia’s Symbian phone shipments declined precipitously last quarter as demand dropped in key emerging markets, such as China. The company’s current smartphone woes make a speedy transition to products powered by the Windows Phone operating system, upon which it has bet its smartphone future, critical.

Research In Motion’s BlackBerry unit decline continued last quarter, reaching levels not seen since 2009. Like Nokia, RIM is a company in transition. Smartphones running on its new platform, BB 10, will be released later this year. Until then, results like these may be a sign of things to come.

HTC’s struggles in the U.S. market once again negatively affected its overall performance. However, its relatively strong performance in Asia/Pacific still allowed the company to maintain its position among the top 5 smartphone vendors. The company is staking future success in large part on its One X and S products.

New York, NY and Redmond, WA (April 30, 2012) – Barnes & Noble Inc. (NYSE: BKS) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) today announced the formation of a strategic partnership in a new Barnes & Noble subsidiary, which will build upon the history of strong innovation in digital reading technologies from both companies. The partnership will accelerate the transition to e-reading, which is revolutionizing the way people consume, create, share and enjoy digital content.

The new subsidiary, referred to in this release as Newco, will bring together the digital and College businesses of Barnes & Noble. Microsoft will make a $300 million investment in Newco at a post-money valuation of $1.7 billion in exchange for an approximately 17.6% equity stake. Barnes & Noble will own approximately 82.4% of the new subsidiary, which will have an ongoing relationship with the company’s retail stores. Barnes & Noble has not yet decided on the name of Newco.

One of the first benefits for customers will be a NOOK application for Windows 8, which will extend the reach of Barnes & Noble’s digital bookstore by providing one of the world’s largest digital catalogues of e-Books, magazines and newspapers to hundreds of millions of Windows customers in the U.S. and internationally.

The inclusion of Barnes & Noble’s College business is an important component of Newco’s strategic vision. Through the newly formed Newco, Barnes & Noble’s industry leading NOOK Study software will provide students and educators the preeminent technology platform for the distribution and management of digital education materials in the market.

“The formation of Newco and our relationship with Microsoft are important parts of our strategy to capitalize on the rapid growth of the NOOK business, and to solidify our position as a leader in the exploding market for digital content in the consumer and education segments,” said William Lynch, CEO of Barnes & Noble. “Microsoft’s investment in Newco, and our exciting collaboration to bring world-class digital reading technologies and content to the Windows platform and its hundreds of millions of users, will allow us to significantly expand the business.”

“The shift to digital is putting the world’s libraries and newsstands in the palm of every person’s hand, and is the beginning of a journey that will impact how people read, interact with, and enjoy new forms of content,” said Andy Lees, President at Microsoft. “Our complementary assets will accelerate e-reading innovation across a broad range of Windows devices, enabling people to not just read stories, but to be part of them. We’re at the cusp of a revolution in reading.”

Barnes & Noble and Microsoft have settled their patent litigation, and moving forward, Barnes & Noble and Newco will have a royalty-bearing license under Microsoft’s patents for its NOOK eReader and Tablet products. This paves the way for both companies to collaborate and reach a broader set of customers.

Companies are buying them – or plan to. The Clark County, Nevada school system spent more than $1 million over six months on more than 1,800 iPads for facualty, administrators and students. The Financial Times spent more than $1 million over six months buying nearly 2,000 subsidized iPads for its entire staff.

But why are they buying, and what are they hoping to get for their money?

In the case of the Financial Times, it looks like they were fishing for style. Their CEO acknowledged that the subsidy was essentially a bonus – a “recognition of your contribution to our strong performance this year.” For most businesses, the primary benefit appears to be portability, which explains the tablet’s appeal to education, sales and other mobile-minded groups. An Accenture report claims that mobility is indeed, king. “Arguably, [the tablet’s killer app in the enterprise] is the tablet itself enabling instant access to thousands of Web-enabled apps. ”  It’s an excellent point. Mobile access to enterprise data is what made the smartphone market, and tablets have several key advantages in those areas. And there are dedicated tablet apps from folks as well-heeled as SAP. But business apps that couldn’t exist on anything but a tablet? Those are harder to find.

The Forrester report summed up the current state of the enterprise tablet:

Users want to accomplish work primarily through their PCs – where they can consume, collaborate, and create. But they also recognize that during certain times, in certain locations, or when mobile they prefer to use nonstandard form factors, including tablets – where they can consume and collaborate, but not create.

The real opportunity, though, is to create business applications that work better on a tablet than on other platforms.

By Cormac Foster, RWW  For full details, please click here

Microsoft’s big vision: Whether you’re using your TV, PC, tablet, phone, or almost any other device that comes along, you’ll be able to accomplish all the same tasks through all the same platform. The form factor will change, but the core experience won’t.

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