Dutch operator Royal KPN is rumored to be considering a sale of its German cell towers to American Tower for about $500 million, according to a Bloomberg report. American Tower recently missed out on a deal to take over T-Mobile USA’s cell towers. In September, Crown Castle International said it would pay $2.4 billion to lease and operator T-Mobile’s 7,200 cell towers for the next 28 years.
CTIA is taking steps to improve the industry’s environmental record with its new Green Working Group, which will focus on handset packaging and recycling devices and accessories. Members of the group include wireless operators like AT&T, Verizon Wireless, Sprint, T-Mobile and U.S. Cellular, as well has handset manufacturers such as Apple, Nokia, Motorola Mobility, Research In Motion and Samsung.
Samsung’s Windows 8-based ATIV tablet and its Android Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 will arrive at AT&T on Friday. The ATIV is priced at $800 while the Tab runs for $500. AT&T is promoting the tablets with $100 off the purchase of any Samsung connected device with the purchase of a Galaxy smartphone.
Mindspeed Technologies has sold off its “non-core” patents for $6 million to an undisclosed company. Mindspeed specializes in low-power system-on-chip solutions for 3G and LTE networks, and its analog products are used in optical, enterprise, industrial and video transport systems.
AT&T has announced availability and pricing for three new Windows 8 smartphones. Beginning Nov. 9, AT&T customers will be able to purchase the Nokia Lumia 920 for $99.99 and the Nokia Lumia 820 for $49.99. Before Thanksgiving, customers can pick-up the Windows Phone 8X by HTC with 16 GB of memory for $199.99. Additionally, AT&T revealed an exclusive version of the Windows Phone 8X by HTC with 8 GB of memory in California Blue and Limelight (yellow) for $99.99. AT&T is only carrier to offer this device in Limelight.
MobileIron today introduced the first complete “mobile app persona” for the enterprise. MobileIron customers can now secure data-at-rest and data-in-motion for business apps. An enterprise app persona includes all the apps and data used for business on a mobile device. It is associated with a specific user, based on that user’s identity, and managed through policy. MobileIron is launching two new products for establishing and securing an enterprise app persona. The first product is MobileIron AppConnect, which containerizes apps to protect app data-at-rest without touching personal data. The second product is MobileIron AppTunnel, which provides tunneling and access control to protect app data-in-motion without requiring VPN.
