NEWS IN BRIEF
Daily Digest 16 February
16-02-2010
by Deirdre McArdle
HTC unveils new phones | NewBay strikes Deutsche Telekom deal
Mobile maker HTC debuted three new mobile phones -- Legend, Desire and HD Mini -- at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Tuesday. The Android-powered Legend's focus is very much on design; it features an aluminium unibody casing and a 3.2 inch touchscreen. The Desire, also running on Android, looks like Google's recently released Nexus One but features HTC Sense, the manufacturer's own user interface. Both handsets have an app called 'HTC Friend Stream' which flows together Twitter, Facebook and Flickr updates and lets you organise your friends into groups. Finally, the HD Mini is a smaller, less-powerful version of HTC's HD2. The three new handsets are likely to hit the European market by April.
In more news from the Mobile World Congress, Irish mobile software company NewBay has signed a deal with Deutsche Telekom. The deal will see NewBay's LifeCache Social Networking Gateway and LifeCache Media Upload Client being deployed to power the upload of photos, videos and audio filed to Deutsche Telekom's Media Centre. Financial details of the deal were not revealed.
In addition, Cork-based Azotel has announced that it has partnered with WAV, which distributes wireless, security, RFID, VoIP and portable data-collection equipment to wireless broadband providers in the US and Canada. WAV will use Azotel's SIMPLer platform, which includes WISP in a Box (WIB) and Hotspot in a Box (HIB). These products automate all the core network functions of setting up a WISP and a hotspot, according to Azotel. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.
Also attending the Mobile World Congress is Minister for Science, Technology and Innovation Conor Lenihan, who is supporting the Irish mobile firms who are exhibiting at the event. "The strong Irish presence at this congress in Barcelona underlines Ireland's growing international reputation as a key source of innovative and groundbreaking solutions in mobile communications," he said. The Irish companies at the event accompanied by Enterprise Ireland are: Anam Mobile, Aran Tech, Cibenix, Dial2Do, Digital Reach Group, iConX, i-Traffic, Jivo, NewBay Software, Nowcasting International, Redmere, Sentry Wireless, The Now Factory, Yougetitback and Zapa Technology.
The counterfeit medicines market in Ireland is worth EUR86 million per year, according to a report commissioned by Pfizer called 'Cracking Counterfeit Europe'. One-fifth of the Irish people surveyed admitted to buying medicines through illicit sources. The report also revealed that thousands of Irish people purchase medicines online despite the fact that between 50 percent and 90 percent of medicines bought online are fake. According to the research, the main reasons people consider going online to access medicines is to save time and money, with over a quarter of people in Ireland surveyed (27 percent) doing so because it's quick and convenient, and over two-thirds (70 percent) wanting to save money. Elsewhere in the report, 6.5 percent of respondents said they have bought medicine from spam or e-mail offers.
Almost half of maths teachers at secondary school level are not qualified in that particular subject. That's according to research based on a survey of principals and maths teachers by Dr Maire Ni Riordain and Dr Ailish Hannigan at the University of Limerick. The survey shows that these "out-of-field" maths teachers are primarily qualified to teach science and business rather than maths, and are assigned to teach maths to students in the early years of secondary school. "This highlights a significant divide in post-primary schools between students who are taught by qualified mathematics teachers and those who are taught by out-of-field teachers of mathematics, with younger and weaker students most often taught by out-of-field teachers," said Dr Hannigan. The report also showed that 75 percent of the unqualified maths teachers said they would undertake a maths qualification if it was provided during training.
Caped Koala Studios has built a virtual world for kids, combining education and social networking 