Xiaomi looks to Singapore next

The Xiaomi MiPhone 3.
(Credit: Xiaomi)

You may soon be able to buy Xiaomi's smartphones in Singapore. At a press conference in Taiwan, Hugo Barra, former Android vice president at Google and new VP of Xiaomi said that the island state will be the next place the Chinese handset maker is looking to expand to.

Tech In Asia reports that Barra and his team visited Singapore a few weeks ago and are trying to set up operations there as quickly as possible. Barra also added that Singapore's an "important hub in the region," and while no exact date was given, the company has plans to start business in Singapore in early 2014.

Xiaomi's handsets have been ridiculously popular in China, they usually sell out within minutes of being put up for sale on its Web site. Its handsets, in particularly the newest flagship, the Xiaomi MiPhone 3, pack speedy hardware at really low prices.

The company currently only sells its handsets in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. With Singapore next, it looks like Southeast Asia will be the next region Xiaomi will be focus on.

Intel CEO taking big steps to overhaul chipmaker

Intel CEO Brian Krzanich is serious about shaking things up.

Intel's CEO is putting the world's largest chipmaker on a fast track to change. That become clear Thursday at the company's investor meeting, happening in the shadow of a declining PC market.

Intel will open its factories to "any company" that wants to tap its leading-edge manufacturing capabilities, CEO Brian Krzanich said today.

To date, Intel has taken a very cautious, small-scale approach to making chips on a contract-manufacturing basis.

Separately, in one of the biggest revelations, Intel will develop a phone chip called "SoFIA" that will be built at a factory outside the company for 2014. If investors are looking for a sign of changes at Intel, this is probably the biggest.

That chip will have integrated global 3G and HSPA+ and the communications component will be based on an ARM design.

"SoFIA...is pragmatic targeting the entry-level market," said RBC Capital Markets analyst Doug Freedman in a research note.

And Intel is pursuing the tablet market with a vengeance. The company is aiming to quadruple tablets shipped with its chips to 40 million tablets in 2014.

Another sign is Intel's newfound focus on modem chips. For example, a future multimode modem will integrate the latest broadband tech, including TD-LTE and TD-SCDMA.

"The company is shipping its 7160 LTE product (7260 LTE-A to be out next year) as they believe products are world-class. Focus on smartphones is now focused on big players developing targeted solutions," wrote Freedman.

SSD manufacturer OCZ files for bankruptcy

(Credit: OCZ Technologies)

After failing to comply with the terms of its loan, SSD manufacturer OCZ Technologies has now filed for bankruptcy. The company will be dissolved, and not restructured, according to the conditions set out by loan owner Hercules Technology Growth Capital. Before this, OCZ was not doing well and had taken up a loan from Hercules at a steep 15 percent interest rate.

Besides solid state drives, the company produces power supply units. It previously used to make RAM chips but discontinued that due to the weakening global DRAM market.

The company also has an offer from Toshiba Corporation to acquire all of the company's assets. If accepted, besides OCZ's intellectual property, current employees will also be able to keep their jobs.

If the bankruptcy court rejects the offer, OCZ will then have no choice but to be liquidated.

Samsung launches 1TB mSATA 840 EVO SSD

(Credit: Samsung)

Samsung has announced a new 1TB mSATA solid-state drive, part of its 840 Evo series of SSDs. Used mainly in notebooks, an mSATA SSD is much smaller than a regular 2.5-inch hard drive, making it useful for smaller computers or as a second hard drive. In some higher-end laptops, manufacturers use both an mSATA SSD (for the OS, so you get faster boot up and loading) and a 2.5-inch mechanical drive (for higher-capacity storage). With the new 1TB (1000GB) mSATA SSD from Samsung, there's now an option to do without the regular hard drive and still get a decent amount of storage.

The Samsung 840 Evo series is the company's latest range of SSDs, using triple-level cell (TLC) flash. This is a more cost efficient alternative to single- and multi-level cell SSDs, enabling Samsung to sell their latest drives at competitive prices. There is a slight compromise to performance, but the significance of this is muted since it is still very much faster than a regular mechanical hard drive.

According to the Korean company, the new mSATA drive has maximum read and write speeds of 540 MB/s and 530 MB/s respectively. This puts it on par with the 2.5-inch version of the 840 EVO, so you won't be getting slower performance just because it's smaller in size.

While the focus is the 1TB mSATA SSD, an industry first, the new drive also comes in 120GB, 250GB and 500GB capacities.

The retail packaging of the new Samsung mSATA SSD.
(Credit: Samsung)

Although such components are mainly bought by notebook manufacturers who integrate them into their products, a retail box was also shown in the blog post, which means it's likely to be sold to end-users, too.

The announcement was made on the Samsung Tomorrow blog and no price was given. It'll probably not come cheap, though. There's, so far, no such thing as an inexpensive 1TB SSD -- even on sale, the 2.5-inch versions cost about US$500. We've contacted Samsung for more information on price and availability and will update this post accordingly.

PSG tried everything to sign Ronaldo"

In an interview on French football programme 'Telefoot', Leonardo de Araújo, the former PSG sporting director, confessed that the French club had pulled out all the stops in the bid to tempt Cristiano Ronaldo to Paris.

"We thought about signing Cristiano Ronaldo. We did everything we could to get him, to convince him to leave Real Madrid and play for PSG, but he didn't want to, it proved impossible. He told us that Paris Saint-Germain had a great team but that he preferred to stay at Real Madrid."

The Parisian club also considered Juventus midfielder, Pogba: "He is at the level to play for PSG of course. We tried to sign him but didn't succeed there either."

When asked about the Ballon d'Or, the former international footballer, who played on the winning side in the 1994 World Cup in the US, said: "Cristiano Ronaldo, Messi and Ribéry are the best players. I prefer Ribéry, but both Cristiano Ronaldo and Messi have done more than enough to deserve it."

On Monday FIFA and France Football will announce - in alphabetical order - the list of the three finalists who will compete for the coveted award. This time, Lionel Messi is not favourite to win, as the firm favourite is Cristiano Ronaldo.

Leonardo de Araújo also praised the current PSG coach Laurent Blanc: "He's doing a great job. He brings a French perspective to the team and that's very important."

Guardiola lobbies for Ribéry's Ballon d'Or bid

Franck Ribéry's starring performance on his return to the Bayern Munich line-up, with a brace of goals and assists in the 7-0 drubbing of Werder Bremen, backed up the view held by the club's coach and president, Pep Guardiola and Uli Hoeness, that the Frenchman would be a worthy Ballon d'Or winner.

"Franck had an incredible season last year and deserves this award", Guardiola raved following Saturday's thrashing, in which fit-again Ribéry was in sensational form, despite having been out for a couple of weeks with a fractured rib.

Club president Uli Hoeness chimed in, stating: "No other player in the world deserves it as much as Franck. If he doesn't win it, it would be a huge injustice".

"I find it amazing that there's funny business going on related to this, but there is", Hoeness continued, before refusing to elaborate.

Leaving aside these conspiracy theories, Hoeness was keen to celebrate Ribéry's performance against Bremen, calling the Frenchman "an exceptional player and a beacon for Bayern's current clout – he is synonymous with what we're all about".

Guardiola, however, spoke less dramatically than the Bayern president on the subject of the Ballon d'Or. "It isn't going to change his life, his career or our opinion of him", stressed the Catalan coach.

The golden boys

FIFA and France Football have officially announced that Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi and Franck Ribéry are the three finalists competing for this year's Ballon d'Or. The winner of the world's most prestigious individual award will be announced on 13th January in Zurich.

Messi has made the final cut every year since 2007. That year he came third behind Kaká and Cristiano Ronaldo. He was runner-up in 2008, behind CR7. He won the award for the first time in 2009. Since then he has been unstoppable, winning again in 2010, 2011 and 2012.

Being a finalist is nothing new to Ronaldo either. He was second in 2007, before winning the award in 2008. Since then, Messi has stood in the way of any further wins. He was second in 2009, 2011 and 2012, but he failed to make the final cut in 2010.

The three finalists have all had very different years. Leo Messi was unplayable between January and April, before an injury in the Champions League marked the start of a series of problems that are still plaguing him today. However, this did not stop him scoring 47 league goals.

Ribéry has been the flagship player of a Bayern side that has won everything, including the Bundesliga and the Champions League.

Cristiano Ronaldo has had an outstanding end to 2013, putting in match-winning performances for both Real Madrid and Portugal.