Hey.

The hot season has come, this week the launch of new smartphones and accessories from Samsung, so prices and dates will be announced on the evening of August 5, everything else is more or less clear. The first views and reviews will appear quite quickly, so don’t miss it.

Last week was also eventful, for example, the best show of the decade without any discounts was the antitrust hearing in the US Congress, the defendants were Apple, Amazon, Facebook and Google. CEOs of companies have not been so beautifully smeared in public for a long time, someone behaved well, like Tim Cook, someone tried not to cry, like an Indian boy from Google. I highly recommend reading the material about these hearings, as it simply would not fit in the Biryulek format. If you’ve watched Billions, then believe me, real hearings are much more interesting and important. Based on their results, apparently, Facebook will be divided into small parts so that it would be discouraging to contradict the President of the United States.

The more difficult the market situation, the more questions for detailed study. I was waiting for a report from Apple, as it was key for the company. The question stood squarely: they would report honestly and talk about their problems or draw numbers to show off. The second happened, and this is very bad in all aspects, Enron’s laurels seem to haunt someone. We will talk about this in a separate article in a separate article this week, there is simply not enough space here.

In Russia, too, everything is raging, the operators started a small revolution and, without the formal approval of the regulator (there was no ban either), they launched eSIM. I think that this is the topic we need to start our release with, let’s go!

Content

1. eSIM in Russia is more than a SIM card
2. Smartphone sales in the second quarter of 2020 – versions of research companies
3. What threatens ARM during the sale – Softbank in search of money
4. How Yandex imposed the Telemost application without demand
5. The flagship of Xiaomi vacuum cleaners is the Dreame V11. First experience

eSIM in Russia is more than a SIM card

Some things do not get tired to amaze, for example, the Russian people’s craving for everything new, a kind of natural curiosity. Novelty in Russia is part of the image, and the image of the social. To some extent, this is a statement that you have reached some kind of hidden understanding of things and therefore have chosen this thing. And if the stuff turns out to be useful, then it begins to spread throughout the country like a steppe fire. Sometimes the novelty looks pathetic, just remember the fashion for CDs on the windshield, which interfered with the work of traffic police radars. It is good that this stage of mania passed rather quickly and painlessly.

Novelty is important not only in Russia, there are also adherents of novelty in the world, but either there are not so many of them, or for other reasons they are not so noticeable. When Apple launched microSIM and then nanoSIM cards, it turned the market into a kind of bazaar. Scissors for cutting SIM cards, “hole punches” for the same purpose, but gradually operators began to make universal cards for any size – three in one. Since a SIM card is a purely utilitarian thing, in everyday life it does not give anything additional for its user and his phone, it was surprising to me to observe how people sincerely believed that the smaller the card, the better. Newness multiplied by the habit of thinking that miniaturization is a companion to progress. The lack of a corresponding slot in many smartphones became a limitation for the manifestation of craving for new products, that is, the same nanoSIM card could initially only be installed in the iPhone. I sincerely doubt that someone reached such a level of enlightenment in their love of novelty that they chose this smartphone because of the different size of the SIM card, but I am sure that this was one of the cool points – and I, you know, have a SIM- the map is so small.

You probably think that no one could think that this is fiction. But let’s look at the example of eSIM-cards, how people rushed to change their usual SIM-cards for the sake of “electronic” ones. Although the first “e” in the abbreviation eSIM is not about electronics at all, it is an abbreviation of the word “embedded”. For lovers of sizes, I have a picture in store, eSIM is not at all devoid of physical embodiment, it is a microcircuit that is just slightly smaller than even a nanoSIM card.

In a car, phone or tablet, M2M devices, such a microcircuit allows you to store several profiles of SIM cards that are downloaded over the network. The advantage for the manufacturer is obvious, you can sell a smartphone with preinstalled cards of different operators, give the user a choice which one to prefer depending on the tariff or needs. Apple was the first to feel this, so, in the tablets of the eSIM company they were given a choice of different operators, but at that time the offer did not take off, the operators themselves were against it. None of them wanted to give control over SIM-cards in favor of the hardware manufacturer both then and today. Apple poked around with eSIM, but could not figure out how to make money on the operators, they refused to pay for the standard, which is generally accepted. But Apple has consistently added eSIM to its smartphones since the iPhone X. Since the eSIM card is still adjacent to the usual one, for most iPhone users this has become a real opportunity to get two SIM cards in a smartphone, this opportunity has been unavailable for them for many years. There were no limits to jubilation, but in the absence of eSIM cards from operators on the Russian market, the option itself became not very important. On the other hand, when traveling, this made it possible to download roaming cards and then easily get rid of them by simply deleting the profile.

Most smartphones that support eSIM are flagships (the most affordable model in the current 2020 lineup is the iPhone SE, other smartphones cost more than 40 thousand rubles). Therefore, there is no need to talk about the massive use of eSIM, the time for this technology has not yet come for the masses. But the fact that this will happen soon is beyond doubt, gradually eSIM will begin to appear in the models of the middle segment, and then in budget devices. One of the Russian operators even plans to hold a tender in the fall to create the most affordable smartphone with eSIM, the target cost is 15 thousand rubles. This is an old trick, when operators popularized certain technologies, released smartphones for themselves with a minimum cost and the presence of NFC or the presence of 4G, and so on. That is, they tried to introduce the technology to the masses, and at the same time get their portion of good PR.

Last week, Beeline and MegaFon began rolling out eSIM for their subscribers, so far only in Moscow and St. Petersburg, but the trouble has begun. Before that, you could get an eSIM card from Tinkoff Mobile, and in some ways they became revolutionaries. Initially, a “test” with such cards was launched in “Tele2”, but it was a false start, which turned into an abuse with the regulator.

The regulator has not yet decided how to work with eSIM cards, and the issue remains politicized, for example, this stops MTS from introducing such cards for its subscribers. The operator remained in the minority, since after the demarche of both Beeline and MegaFon, today virtually all operators in Russia provide an opportunity to receive eSIM cards, even if not throughout the country. But it is clear that eSIM has already come for a long time and further their number will only increase.

What is the beauty of eSIM from our operators? This is exactly the same SIM card that you have in your phone, but if you own an iPhone, then this is the easiest way to add a second operator to your phone. Hurray, there is a dual-SIM, and there is no need to look for Chinese devices with two SIM-cards. In the same Galaxy Fold, only one SIM-card is supported, so eSIM allows you to use the second one (I have MegaFon and Beeline for a very long time, and I like this option). In smartphones with a combined SIM and memory card slot, eSIM is the easiest way to get two cards working. That is, there is a sense in some scenarios, and it is good.

There is one more thing that, in the absence of eSIM from our operators, was not so relevant. You can download up to five eSIM profiles to your smartphone. And in the menu you can switch them depending on your needs, this is a very convenient option. Of the absolute disadvantages of the current implementation, I note that you cannot save the eSIM, you cannot transfer it to another smartphone. Change your smartphone – please get the QR code from your operator again.

How the distribution of eSIM in Moscow looks like on the example of Beeline. You can download the application “My Beeline” (do not log in to it!), And then select eSIM. You need to take a picture of your passport, buy a tariff (half of the amount will be given to you for the first month), and you’re done.

Those who already have a Beeline SIM card will have to go to the office with a passport to replace their physical card with a virtual one. You will be printed a statement to change your SIM card, and then you will be given a piece of paper with instructions and a QR code.

It is important that you have Wi-Fi on your smartphone (but not mobile Internet and another SIM card), scan the code, and your new eSIM starts immediately, there are no differences, it looks exactly the same in the menu.

It is important to understand that now you are tied to your smartphone, you will not be able to remove the SIM card as before and insert it into another device. In the future, all operators plan to expand the capabilities of applications so that existing subscribers can reload their SIM cards, but this will not happen until 2021, and the specific dates are completely hidden in the fog. The technology itself is making its first steps in the operator market all over the world, and Russia is at the forefront here.

Should you rush to the operator’s store to change your SIM card to an eSIM? It depends on you, it is possible that you want to get two SIM-cards in your smartphone, but you simply have no other option. Then this is the way out. For everyone else, there is no point in this, you will get exactly the same opportunities. One of the advantages of the technology is that eSIM does not break, unlike a regular physical SIM card (the time between failures of a microcircuit is much higher), but ordinary SIM cards also become unusable after 5-10 years of active use. From a security point of view, everything is also good, there are no differences in implementation.

Why at the beginning did I start talking about fashion for new technologies in Russia? The answer is that starting on Friday and without any advertising, those who wanted to get eSIM went to the operators’ stores. I was in several stores, and everywhere the same picture, one or two people came in the morning, replaced their SIM cards, someone bought an eSIM. Operators because of the regulator do not want to disclose data on eSIM connections, so that all this does not come out sideways. But even according to the most conservative estimates, in three days it was a couple of thousand eSIM cards that were issued as new, there were several hundred replacements. This is a great indicator for new technology and a display of how people love new toys and strive to get them. Although there is not very much practical sense here. And I say this with confidence, since I learned from a private conversation with one of the operators that the vast majority of eSIM cards live in devices alone, that is, users do not put them in order to get two SIM cards. For them, this is a kind of fashion, and nothing more. Have you succumbed to this fashion? Will you change your SIM card to eSIM if possible? What drives you if you do this?

Smartphone sales in the second quarter of 2020 – versions of research companies

There was no doubt that the second quarter of 2020 will be extremely bad for the smartphone market. The closure of countries to quarantine, the lack of retail sales and the lethargy of operators, the delay in the release of many new products – all this, multiplied by negative consumer expectations, did not inspire any confidence. The only question was how much the market and each specific manufacturer would fall. For me, Apple’s report was of particular interest, since the company could not afford to show a real drop in sales, and the corporation’s financiers did not disappoint, they drew sales in a falling market, and such that even my breath stops. This is such a key issue that it is impossible to simply dwell on it within the framework of Biryulek, it must be discussed separately and in detail. Just think – an increase of 25% in piece terms at a time when almost all Apple stores were closed, operators around the world were reporting a drop in equipment sales, and online accounted for no more than 20% of all possible sales. All fell without exception, and only one anomaly formed in the market, this is Apple.

Look at the data from IDC, they demonstrate this point very well.

But I think that the important point is the share of Huawei, which, despite the sanctions, continued to grow, albeit not so quickly. Moreover, for the first time in history, Huawei is leading the world in smartphone shipments. The reason for this is the patriotism of the Chinese and the fact that the home market has become the main one for the company, where Huawei eats up sales of Oppo, Vivo and other brands. We talked about this at the end of last year, now it has happened. Arriving in small Chinese cities with branded Huawei stores, the company ramped up sales and did it instantly. Look at CounterPoint’s market share in China.

Against the background of falling foreign markets, China remained one of the more or less alive, and this played into the hands of Huawei. But the company is unlikely to be able to repeat this result in the future (in Russia, Huawei / Honor is also in first place in unit sales, third in money).

Note that almost all of the companies, plus or minus, have retained their market shares, with the exception of Huawei and Apple. But if for Huawei we have an explanation of the situation, then for Apple it is extremely difficult to find these sales in the real world (aliens flew in to help, now I’m sure of that). But we will return to Apple, as I said, in a separate article, the drawn results are very characteristic of the company’s problems.

Look at Canalys’ assessment of the market, the numbers are slightly different, but the outline is exactly the same.

And here is the Counterpoint score.

Year to year, the smartphone market fell by at least 50 million units, which is significant in itself. This is a gigantic fall that will be felt for a long time, and it is extremely difficult to rectify the situation.

What threatens ARM during the sale – Softbank in search of money

One of the rumors that are captivating the imagination with the opening prospects is that Softbank is looking for a buyer for the ARM holding. It was bought in 2016 for $ 32 billion, and the price did not seem high even then. Let me remind you that it is the ARM architecture that is used everywhere in processors for various devices, from watches to smartphones. Someone uses ARM cores as they are, some companies, like Apple, make changes to them for themselves, but inside it is still the same ARM. In the coming year, for the first time, laptops based on ARM processors will enter the market for the first time, which will also expand their field of application. In short, ARM is doing great, but Softbank lost billions during this crisis, and it needs to fill the holes, and this can be done by selling significant assets.

Rumors claim that negotiations between Softbank and Nvidia are taking place, but they have not yet reached a specific deal. As usual in such cases, there is no specifics, which leaves a wide field for speculation. But even the potential for such a merger raises many difficult questions. Nvidia’s position is that it is the most important American semiconductor corporation, recently overtaking Intel in terms of capitalization. In graphic solutions, the company de facto does not have strong and noticeable competitors, and the rate on clouds has played a role, and sales in general are growing. Nvidia’s future is bright, and like ARM, they played their cards right. At the same time, the company has not yet turned into a huge clumsy monster, which is also important.

The value of the company clearly stands in the way of a possible deal. The minimum estimate is $ 40 billion, which will force Nvidia to seek this money. The second problem is solved much worse, this is the approval of the antimonopoly authorities, there may be problems. Today Nvidia licenses ARM, is a client of the company. With ARM at its disposal, Nvidia will be able to dictate the direction of development for the market. On the other hand, for the first time we will get a symbiosis between excellent processors and graphics, a kind of synergy.

My opinion is that it is better for ARM to remain independent from manufacturers, and there are no difficulties in this, the company is doing great, and nothing threatens it in the coming years. Equal distance from all manufacturers guarantees the absence of preferences, which is good for us as consumers. On the other hand, more and more often politics interferes with technology and business, and this is worth remembering.

In China, ARM has a company called ARM China (49% owned by ARM). It was created in 2018 to sell licenses for ARM architecture to Chinese developers, to help them build their devices. It was also necessary in order to collect money from small and medium-sized players who are focused on the local market. The CEO of ARM China, Allen Wu, turned out to be a good guy, at the same time he participated in the Alphatecture company, which offered exactly the same clients assistance in creating chip designs. There is a strong sense that the Chinese government is behind this fund, which encourages local development. Here we can talk not just about a conflict of interest, but about the fact that the name ARM opened the doors for Alphatecture, and then it was possible to persuade partners to choose their solutions (I am sure that this was served under the sauce “just like in ARM, only cheaper” ).

The scandal erupted after ARM discovered this behavior of its CEO and invited him to leave. The firing was not easy, as Allen simply refused to step down as CEO. And the lack of a controlling stake in the joint venture does not allow ARM to legally resolve this issue. A stalemate ensued, and today ARM is appealing to the Chinese authorities to help resolve the conflict. In the Western press, the idea often comes through that the question needs to be raised more broadly and that this is a conflict between Western companies and China. And if China does not help ARM, then the exodus of Western business from the country will begin. Reflections are good in isolation from the harsh reality, since the outcome to nowhere is unlikely. Today there is no other country as a production base that provides such prices and opportunities. And therefore, ARM is unlikely to become a precedent in the political struggle. But the situation itself is curious, it shows how quickly inside China they are trying to create their own solutions, to get rid of the need to be based on the same ARM. It seems fantastic and something impossible, but only at first glance, in the future it will become a reality, and in the very near future. The way Huawei is taking this path is extremely revealing.

How Yandex imposed the Telemost application without demand

In an era of great dislike, each of us has favorites and those whose behavior causes rejection at the cellular level. Yandex has tablets in its office, on which it is written how to rake a full panama hat and do it with minimal effort. A new generation of Yandex has grown up who never knew how Yandex liked to impose its products on users and did it without their demand. The best practices of Mail.Ru in the service of the right company.

During the week Yandex was happily collecting comments from people who unexpectedly discovered the new Telemost application on their smartphones, computers (Windows or Mac, it doesn’t matter, you are all equal). Yandex is closely following the take-off of Zoom and has made its own messenger, but in order to achieve the maximum number of installations, they acted uncomplicatedly, installed Telemost by default for all Yandex.Disk users.

The application was launched on June 15, but, apparently, users were not eager to install it, and in order to somehow remedy the situation, Yandex did it simply – they made this application part of Yandex.Disk. Why was video calls added to the messenger? There is no answer to this question; apparently, this is the only Yandex product in which managers agreed to this experiment.

There is a simple clause in the license agreement for Yandex applications that the user agrees and gives permission to install applications without his additional consent, including third-party applications. This is a bad practice, and earlier in “Yandex” claimed that this was the intrigue of lawyers, just in case. And they nodded with great understanding that lawyers are such people, and we are a mountain behind you and will never do this to you.

Yandex’s support to angry users who did not ask for any Telemost reported happily that they should try it anyway.

It is legally impossible to present something to Yandex, the company can do anything, including delete your files. In 2013, Yandex.Disk deleted the Windows system folder, it happened by accident. I think that there should be no questions as to why this is so, as well as why Yandex.Disk got there (Comrade Major was always picky about what to look for). I use Yandex.Disk for work, but I never install it as an application on computers, only a browser and only for the time when I download files.

Vladimir Rusinov, the head of Yandex.Disk, decided to defend his brainchild and spoke on the corporate blog.

The explanation is ridiculous, they wanted the best, it turned out as always. The person in charge of the product claims that it is impossible to uninstall Telemost, which is not true for both MacOS and Windows, there is a way to remove the application folder, and it disappears.

But most of all I liked the final words: Based on the results of this story, we introduced a rule for ourselves: create shortcuts on the desktop only with the user’s consent… Disk and Teleconference will continue to develop as usual. New collaboration tools will appear in Disk, and Telemost will soon get a separate client. Please write to me about everything that you like and dislike in the Teleconference, at v_rusinov@yandex-team.ru or in the comments to this post.

Is Vladimir alone in Yandex responsible for Disk? Besides him, there are no other people who have potentially been on the Internet and know how it works, what annoys users and causes an unambiguous reaction? In 2020, Yandex promises once again to create shortcuts on the desktop only with the user’s consent! I applaud. It was prudently not given a promise not to install unnecessary software without the consent of the person, since Yandex will continue to do so.

Vladimir quite naturally became a hero, and his panama was quickly filled with grateful Yandex.Disk users, it is a pleasure to read the comments.

What can you say for sure? That Yandex does not learn well from its own mistakes, all this has already happened more than once, and history tends to repeat itself. You cannot do this to users of the products. The most technologically advanced company imposes its services like a gopnik in a dark alley. How did it happen? On the other hand, which I am surprised, the years go by, but everything remains the same.

When people ask me why I do not like Yandex and their approaches to business, I explain it with these specific examples. These “mistakes” have long been systemic and look like an approach, and an apology is almost always an attempt to shift the blame onto the weather, users, and the season. Don’t you think so?

The flagship of Xiaomi vacuum cleaners is the Dreame V11. First experience

Xiaomi has a good idea, the company collects products from other manufacturers and sells them under its own brand, providing them with public attention. Would you rather look at a Xiaomi or Dreame vacuum cleaner? I am sure that you simply have not heard about the second brand.

In handheld, cordless vacuum cleaners, Dyson became a household name, they were the first to offer users a convenient design, sufficient for more or less serious cleaning power. The flagship of the Dyson line is the V11.

Why the Dreame model number V11 is now clear without further explanation, isn’t it? And if you look at this vacuum cleaner, then borrowing a design, a set of brushes does not look surprising.

And this picture is from the Find 10 Differences series. The first photo shows the V11 kit from Dreame, the second from Dyson.

What is the beauty of a Xiaomi vacuum cleaner? In cost! It is two times cheaper than the same Dyson, in Russia you can buy it at a price of 20 to 25 thousand rubles. And for many, this is a weighty argument. Xiaomi users are ready to put up with minor flaws in plastic, the fact that the stand is not very beautiful and needs to be screwed to the wall. All of this redeems the cost.

I have a vacuum cleaner from Samsung Jet Light at home. This is a competitor to Dyson, they are in the same price class.

And I compared V11 with him, collected impressions from several people. First and foremost, the Dreame is lighter, but the maximum power is not as good as in Samsung. Does it play a role? Yes, for sofas, folds and the like, for cleaning dust from the floor, there is no difference, average power is enough. The slightly less power of the V11 translates into longer runtimes – 60, 30 and 10 minutes, respectively. The minimum power is not interesting, it will not be possible to clean it properly. Charging time is about 4 hours, but the battery is built into the handle, you can change it only by unscrewing the screws. That is, replaceable batteries are not provided, again, for most, this will not be a problem. The very scenario of such a vacuum cleaner assumes that it is optional, you use it from time to time. And this is convenient, since you can quickly remove dirt, dust that you unexpectedly found, and not keep the found in your head until the moment of big cleaning and using a standard vacuum cleaner.

In almost half a year, I had such a vacuum cleaner in my house, this is a cool story that helps to maintain cleanliness. And the same Dreame looks like an interesting offer in terms of price / quality ratio, there is no doubt about it. I can’t judge the durability, perhaps you have something from this company and you will tell in the comments how everything turned out in practice. Of the noted disadvantages described in the instructions, it is absolutely impossible to vacuum wet surfaces, wash the flask before cleaning. This is perhaps easy to come to terms with.

PS The week will be shock – a lot of new products, first views and reviews. As well as debriefing on events that have already occurred, in particular, sales of smartphones in the second quarter.

You liked the format of analysis of flagship stores in retail, the first was the flagship from MTS.

I visited the flagship from Svyaznoy, which was described with great fanfare in Vedomosti, and they obviously did it in absentia and did not visit this Moscow store. There are a lot of funny and funny things, although, of course, better than the same MTS. And it cost much less money, so wait for the material, it will be curious.

And as a standard I want to wish you a good working week so that everything goes well for you. A lot of sun, smiles around, and most importantly, do not get sick, watch yourself and your loved ones. Good luck!

Back to content >>>

Related Links

Share: 

we are in social networks:

Anything to add ?! Write … eldar@mobile-review.com