Verizon Wireless turned in another strong quarter with total revenues up 9.1% to $17.7 billion. The carrier ended the quarter with 107.7 million total connections, marking a 6.5% year-over-year increase. It also banked $7.2 billion in net income, increasing 7.5% from the year-ago period.

Verizon Wireless added 1.3 million total connections in the third quarter, including 882,000 retail postpaid customers, and 367,000 wholesale and other connections. By contrast, AT&T added 2.1 million wireless subscribers during the same period, lead heavily by M2M and other connected devices. Read more

BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion biffed its response to last week’s massive outage and worse yet, is coming up short at this week’s BlackBerry DevCon Americas conference. With every month that passes, the smartphone pioneer loses more runway, and with it the ability to carry the BlackBerry brand forward.

Last week’s major outage did no favors for BlackBerry’s already tarnished image. The company needed a strong response to the snafu and should feel tremendous pressure to deliver something meaningful in a few key areas.

Calling its half-hearted apology for last week’s outage a “Thank You Gift from BlackBerry” was poor form. First and foremost, BlackBerry users want their devices to work. A dozen free apps worth $100 will do nothing to keep customers happy. Rather than rewarding its dwindling base of loyal users with something meaningful, RIM is offering its customers apps like SIMS 3, Texas Hold’em Poker 2, Shazam Encore and iSpeech Translator Pro. Read more

Android is now powering more than 190 million devices. Google CEO and co-founder Larry Page calls the platform’s growth “mind boggling.”

Mobile is playing an increasingly important role in the company’s future, but until last week’s earnings call there was little sense of just how much it contributes to the company’s bottom line.

Mobile is now operating at an annual run rate above $2.5 billion, Page said, adding that revenue tied to the company’s mobile operations has grown two-and-a-half times in the last 12 months. Read more

Millions of BlackBerry users spanning at least four continents are without service for a third consecutive day. An untold number of customers, not all however, are unable to send messages, emails or browse the web in parts of North and South America, Africa, Middle East and Europe.

A little more than an hour ago, Research In Motion admitted that it’s still working to resolve the “service issue that many of our BlackBerry customers are experiencing.”

The early outages occurred Monday in Africa, Europe and the Middle East, but as of this morning they have reached the Americas — and they are ongoing. Read more

iPads generate more mobile traffic than all other iOS devices combined

Mobile devices comprised 6.8% of all online traffic in August 2011. Nearly two-thirds of that traffic came from mobile phones while tablets accounted for the remainder, according to a new report from comScore.

The number of U.S. subscribers consuming mobile media grew 19% in the past year to 116 million people. While the growth is noteworthy, it also highlights the large untapped market for mobile data that still exists. Read more

**As published in RCR Wireless News**

Though the two companies increasingly find themselves competing in the same markets and industries, Google Inc. and Apple Inc. appear to be playing nice on at least one front: iOS applications.

Whereas previously Apple blocked some of the applications submitted by Google, more of those apps are now sailing through to safer landings on users iOS devices. This change not only highlights Google and Apple’s delayed reluctance to see eye to eye for the benefit of their users, but also Google’s continued desire to reach mobile users beyond its Android platform. Read more

**As published at RCR Wireless News**

Nokia Corp. continues to buckle under the increasing might and will of its competitors in the smartphone space.

In a note to investors , the company downgraded the financial outlook for its devices and services division for the second (current) quarter and full year of 2010. The company said “multiple factors are negatively impacting Nokia’s business to a greater extent than previously expected.” While that may be true, it would be difficult to conclude that most of these “factors” have come as a surprise to the world’s largest manufacturer of cellphones. Read more

**As published in RCR Wireless News**

LOS ANGELES – To hear Comcast Corp.’s chairman and CEO Brian Roberts tell it, the cable industry is on a collision course with destiny. The seemingly neatly divided world of entertainment that Roberts first jumped into as the son of Comcast’s founder Ralph Roberts is no more.

If all goes his way, the family-run business will pass all regulatory hurdles and close its $30-billion dollar deal to snatch up the controlling interest in General Electric’s NBC Universal by the end of the year. Surely few, if any in the audience here for Roberts’ keynote could have dreamed two decades ago of a cable operator becoming so powerful and flush enough with cash that it could take control of a content juggernaut like NBC. Read more

**As published in RCR Wireless News**

SANTA MONICA, CALIF. – For all the momentum Google’s Android operating system is enjoying of late, there are some key areas that many executives believe Apple has it beat on with the iPhone OS. These differentiating features – billing, user interface, development ease and scale (for at least the time being) — are nothing to scoff at either.

Now, with the iPad already surpassing 1 million units sold in as many months, there’s a reinvigorated sense of interest and easy-to-understand business reasons for placing more focus and investment in Apple’s mobile flavor.

A crowded panel of eight representing big media and publishers at Digital Hollywood yesterday spent considerable time heaping praise and wonder on Apple’s latest gadget. Later on, the OS offerings from BlackBerry, Google, Microsoft and HP-Palm got their fair shake, but Apple kept cropping up as the main draw. Read more

**As published in RCR Wireless News**

SANTA MONICA, Calif. – Kicking off a panel dedicated to video on smartphones at Digital Hollywood yesterday, The Nielsen Co.’s VP of mobile media presented some astonishing statistics that frame the intense battle that’s getting underway between Google Inc.’s Android operating system and Apple Inc.’s iPhone.

Citing fresh data that the research firm put together just in time for the event, Jerry Rocha said smartphones running on the Android operating systems are beating or tying with the iPhone in many use categories. Time will tell whether Android users will maintain their high use data services, but if the trend stays on track Apple might be outdone at its own game very soon.

Android users are outperforming iPhone users on location-based services and mobile video while both user groups are in a dead heat for mobile Internet use at an overall rate of 88%, Rocha said. Data services on the Android operating system has taken off in just the past couple quarters and is currently running at a year-over-year growth rate of 352%, he added. Read more