UK-based grocery store chain Tesco has just bought a majority stake in movie streaming service Blinkbox. Tesco now owns 80 percent of the company, having purchased shares from Eden Ventures and Nordic Venture Partners for an undisclosed amount. The service will compete with Lovefilm, another streaming service, which also incidentally rents physical DVDs and Blu-rays in Tesco stores.
Nokia has confirmed that it will begin selling its new N8 flagship in the UK during the last week of September. The phone will be available directly from the Nokia website. The long delayed device will become available on October 1 from third parties and mobile carriers. All major providers are onboard, including 3, O2, Orange, T-Mobile, Tesco, Virgin and Vodafone, along with retailers such as Carphone Warehouse and Phones4u.
The iPhone 4 is currently in extremely scarce supply in the UK, the Telegraph reports. Out of several carriers, only O2 is said to have any units still in retail shops. None of the companies are selling units online, though Vodafone has set up a back-order process through which people can have phones delivered as soon as new ones come in. A recent resupply shipment was entirely consumed by back-order customers, a Vodafone spokesman notes.
UK supermarket chain Tesco has announced pricing for the iPhone 4, which is set to launch in the region on June 24th. Subscription plans begin at £20 per month for a 12-month contract, which includes 250 voice minutes, unlimited texts and BT Wi-Fi access, and 1GB of cellular data. At the top of three tiers is a £45-per-month plan, attached to a 24-month contract, but with unlimited voice. The cost of a phone itself also declines with more expensive plans; a 16GB model, for example, costs £349 under the £20 plan but only £19 under the £45 scheme.
The iPad will be available from UK Apple Stores at the early hour of 8AM on Friday, Apple has announced. The timing is notable, as rumors suggested that the company would simply open shops at normal hours for the region's iPad launch. Should an Apple Store not be an option, The Times reports that Currys, Dixons Travel and PC World will all carry the tablet beginning at 9AM. Comet, Tesco, John Lewis and Carphone Warehouse will only launch sales two months later, kept out as a result of a deal between Apple and retailer DSGi.
China Unicom has sold over 100,000 iPhones since it first launched the device on October 30th, the carrier now says. While sales have been slower than in some neighbouring countries, namely South Korea, the new figure suggests that sales have not been as poor as has generally been assumed. Just 5,000 iPhones were sold on launch weekend, and an official auction site sold less than a handful in a space of two weeks.
UK supermarket chain Tesco will soon begin carrying the iPhone, according to an announcement. Sales will be conducted by Tesco Mobile, a joint venture with O2, and provided not only via regular Tesco locations but on the web and through the company's nearly 100 dedicated Phone Shops. There are 2,282 Tesco stores in total across the UK, a factor which should help to significantly expand the reach of the iPhone.
Microsoft announced on Wednesday that it has teamed with UK-based retailer Tesco to bring out a new service that will provide customers with DVD-quality movies delivered to them over the web using Microsoft's Silverlight technology. While details are scarce, customers who buy DVD movies from Tesco will be able to download digital copies of the title to their Windows PCs and Macs.
A new logo meant to promote legal music download sites and emphasize the fact the files contained on the sites can be played on any digital audio player has been backed by seven of Britain's largest music download sites, according to a Tuesday BBC report. Designed by the Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA), the logo will mean customers can play the purchased files on PCs, Macs and portable music players. The logo will appear on online music stores from HMV, Woolworths, 7digital, Digitalstores, Play.com, Tescodigital and Tunertribe. Also, BPI, the British record industry's trade association is backing the idea, adding that the logo means artists are being paid for their work.
Dell's upcoming E Slim netbook may have at last been identified, if a leak at Engadget proves authentic. The system uses the same general design language of the Inspiron Mini 9 but is clearly larger and contains different features. Tellingly, the system is running Windows Vista rather than Windows XP; the latter software is only allowed by Microsoft on netbooks with screens at roughly 10 inches or smaller.
British online retailer Tesco today unintentionally slipped details of the Dell Inspiron Z530. The portable appears to be the final version of the E Slim netbook leaked earlier in the year and would sit considerably above the Inspiron Mini 9 in terms of performance. Beyond the larger display, which outputs at at a much sharper 1366x768 resolution, the system would switch to a 40GB hard drive instead of the 16GB flash-based maximum of the Mini and would carry 1GB of RAM as a minimum.
British grocer and retailer Tesco today said it would launch Tesco Downloads, its own attempt at a digital music and video store. The service will follow the cue of Amazon, Wal-Mart, and other similar stores with a web-based interface and initially plans to offer about 3.3 million songs; about 1.6 million of those will be available in unprotected MP3 versions that should work with iPods and other devices that don't support the protected Windows Media Audio format of other songs on the store.
