Tag: competing
Apple’s Rumored 5G Modem for iPhones Has Suppliers Competing for Orders
While the custom-designed modem will likely be manufactured by Apple’s chipmaking partner TSMC, the final packaging stage may be handled by other suppliers. Taiwanese supply chain publication DigiTimes today reported that ASE Technology and Amkor Technology are “competing” to package the modem chips. The two companies already have experience packaging Qualcomm’s modem chips, the report states.
Qualcomm is currently the exclusive supplier of 5G modems for Apple devices, including the entire iPhone 14 lineup, but Apple has long been rumored to be designing its own 5G chip as an in-house replacement. Last month, Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon said he expected Apple’s 5G modem to be ready in 2024, but Bloomberg‘s Mark Gurman reported that it could take up to three years for Apple to fully transition away from Qualcomm.
The first device expected to be equipped with Apple’s custom 5G modem is the fourth-generation iPhone SE, which will likely be released around March 2024. It’s unclear how Apple’s chip would perform compared to Qualcomm’s modems, but the switch to an in-house design would likely reduce Apple’s production costs over time.
In the meantime, all iPhone 15 models are expected to be equipped with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X70 modem, which has further cellular speed and power efficiency improvements compared to the Snapdragon X65 in all iPhone 14 models.
This article, “Apple’s Rumored 5G Modem for iPhones Has Suppliers Competing for Orders” first appeared on MacRumors.com
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Former The Sims studio head is working on a competing life-sim, Life By You
During yesterday’s Paradox Announcement Showcase, we were witness to a teaser trailer for an eerily familiar game called Life By You. Why is it familiar? Well, it looks an awful lot like Paradox’s take on The Sims.
It also comes as no surprise either, considering Life By You is being developed by Paradox Tectonic, with development led by former The Sims studio head and former Second Life CEO, Rod Humble.
The very brief trailer shown for Life By You shows your typical suburban neighbourhood, where players will seemingly get to construct houses of their own. We also get a glimpse inside these homes, where you see characters going about their day-to-day lives. And in all honesty, things look quite rough around the edges. Check it out for yourself in the video embedded above.
Laid-off technology pros are launching their own ventures — and competing with their previous employers
America’s FTC Demands End to Mastercard’s ‘Illegal’ Blocking of Competing Debit Card Payment Networks
The popularity of debit cards has been growing especially quickly for purchases consumers make using their personal devices equipped with ewallet applications such as Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Samsung Wallet. Payment card networks play a critical role in those debit card transactions….
Payment card networks compete for the business of banks that issue cards and for the business of merchants that accept card payments. Mastercard, along with Visa, is one of the two leading payment card networks in the United States. The processing fees charged by networks total billions of dollars every year, affecting every purchase made with a debit card, according to the FTC. Most of these fees are paid by the merchants to the card-issuing banks and the payment card networks….
Mastercard was flouting the law by setting policies to block merchants from routing ecommerce transactions using Mastercard-branded debit cards saved in ewallets to alternative payment card networks, including networks that may charge lower fees than Mastercard, the FTC alleged. Specifically, Mastercard used its control over a process called “tokenization” to block the use of competing payment card networks, the agency alleged. Transactions commonly are “tokenized” by replacing the cardholder’s primary account number with a different number to protect the account number during some stages of a debit transaction. Tokens are stored in ewallets such as Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Samsung Wallet and serve as a substitute credential to provide additional protection for a cardholder’s account number….
According to the FTC, Mastercard refuses to provide conversion services to competing networks for remote ewallet debit transactions…thereby making it impossible for merchants to route their ewallet transactions on a network other than Mastercard.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
FTC orders Mastercard to open debit transactions to competing payment networks
The Federal Trade Commission has ordered Mastercard to start providing competing payment networks with the information they need to process debit card payments. In a proposed enforcement action announced on Friday, the FTC said Mastercard had allegedly violated a provision of the Dodd-Frank act known as the Durbin Amendment by prohibiting merchants from routing transactions over alternative networks.
The action targets “tokenization,” the technology that underpins mobile payment applications like Apple Pay, Google Pay and Samsung Pay. When you go to make a debit or credit card purchase with your phone’s mobile wallet, the software substitutes sensitive information, including the primary number associated with your account, with a separate set of single-use “tokens.” Mastercard and Visa say the practice prevents fraud since tokens contain no exploitable information when they’re in transit. It’s only when they arrive at Mastercard or Visa’s servers, and they’re mapped back to their original account holder, that they point to someone.
According to the FTC, Mastercard has historically stopped competing networks from accessing its token vault. That means whenever consumers decided to pay with a mobile wallet, merchants had to route the transactions over Mastercard (or Visa) and pay the company’s transactions fees, which are typically higher than that of its competitors. The Durbin Amendment calls for banks to support two competing payment networks on all debit cards. It was a provision Congress introduced to promote competition among networks. The FTC didn’t say if it reached a similar agreement with Visa.
“While we are taking these steps to bring this matter to a close, there should be no question that tokenized transactions provide an increased level of protection to both consumers and merchants,” Mastercard spokesperson Seth Eisen told Bloomberg. “This focus on security guides our efforts in a highly competitive market and provides the incentive for us to continue investing in innovations that promote the peace of mind every person expects.” Eisen added Mastercard would “continue to work to update our processes to comply with the consent order and provide even greater choice.”
The FTC plans to collect comments from the public before voting to finalize the order against Mastercard.
Minecraft Legends Developer Diary: Strategic Building, Competing for Resources, and More
RDNA 3 GPUs are ‘competing at $1,000 or below’ leaving the RTX 4090 to ‘a segment of its own’
Derek Lunsford Shares the Emotions Behind Competing at the Mr. Olympia
Anyone who watches how bodybuilder Derek Lunsford carries himself in public likely sees a picture of energy and confidence. However, it doesn’t seem like that’s always an accurate descriptor. That’s because even this elite competitor and former 212 Olympia champion (2021) deals with nerves before the big moments. On Oct. 13, 2022, Lunsford uploaded a … Read more
The post Derek Lunsford Shares the Emotions Behind Competing at the Mr. Olympia appeared first on Breaking Muscle.
The best deals you can still get from Walmart’s competing Prime Day event
Amazon wasn’t the only one offering a deluge of deals earlier this week. If you were looking for alternative places to shop during Amazon’s Prime Early Access Sale — perhaps one that didn’t require you to sign up for a premium membership — Walmart was featuring many of the same deals, dropping notable discounts on standouts like the Apple Watch Series 8 and Beats Fit Pro. While many of the sales have ended, Walmart is still offering discounts on a handful of items, none of which require a Walmart Plus membership to take advantage of.
Below, we’ve rounded up a selection of the best deals you can still get from Walmart’s “Rollbacks and More” sale. Admittedly, the options are limited, but perhaps a new pair of earbuds or a smartwatch is…