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01st FEBRUARY 2021,
- Smartphones May Get Expensive as Government Removed Exemption on Parts of Chargers & Mobiles .
Smartphones may get expensive in the upcoming months as the government has decided to remove exemptions on parts of chargers and mobiles in a bid to promote local manufacturing. The announcement was issued in the Budget 2021 speech by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman. The new budget proposes an increase from 0 to 2.5 percent on customs duty to impose on several parts of mobiles. The new rates will be applicable on inputs, parts or sub-parts for the manufacture of specified parts of mobile phones, including-Printed Circuit Board Assembly (PCBA), Camera module, Connectors.
The rate of customs duty on Printed Circuit Board Assembly [PCBA] of charger or adapter has been increased from 10% to 15%, the government said. Meanwhile, the FM said the Centre was Cutting the Basic Customs Duty rate on nylon chips & fibre. Along with this, the Budget also proposes increasing the customs duty on parts of mobile chargers from Nil to 10 percent. The new rates will come into effect from April 1, 2021. These are likely to produce a direct impact on the prices of smartphones which can increase in the future.
- iCloud Passwords Extension Released on Chrome Web Store; It Helps Access Saved Apple Passwords on Windows.
Apple has introduced an iCloud Passwords Chrome extension. The tech giant didn’t formally announce the new feature, but reports of an iCloud Passwords extension had already been referenced in the release notes of the new iCloud for Windows 10 (ver 12). Which arrived at the end of January, but the link was broken, as the extension was not yet live. That changed when the new Chrome add-on had been published to the Chrome Web Store late on Sunday evening. Now, when Windows users access the new Passwords section, the dialog box that prompts the download will properly function. Â
Once installed, Chrome users on Windows will be able to access any passwords they saved. Or allowed iCloud Keychain to securely generate for them within Safari for macOS or iOS. As Windows users create new credentials, these too will be synced to their iCloud Keychain so they can later be pulled up on Mac, iPhone, and iPad devices. This is the first Chrome extension to support iCloud Keychain on Windows. As before Apple had merely offered an iCloud Bookmarks tool for older Windows 7 and 8 PCs, which reached over 7 million users.
- Google Maps Street View Got Split Screen UI On Android.Â
An update to Google Maps for Android improves the Street View experience by including a split-screen mode. Notably, the split view UI mode is activated once users open Street View after placing a pin on a map location. If the imagery is available for the location then the split UI appears. The maps in the update will let you see where you're heading while following Google Maps. The feature is only limited to Android users as the option to enable split-screen is not visible on the iOS version of Google Maps. Â
When split-screen is enabled, roads with a Street View will be highlighted in Blue colour while photo spheres which are 360-degree panoramic shots appear as dots. Users can see where they are on the map and the direction they are facing, simultaneously. This helps the user to understand their location better. This feature reportedly works in landscape mode and in portrait mode both, but portrait orientation seems to be working better. Street View additionally offers place indicators, giving you an idea of the names of the places around you. Users will need to have Google Maps v10.59.1 to observe this feature.
- UPI Recorded 2.30 Billion Transactions in January; Monthly Growth Rate Dropped To 3%.Â
UPI recorded 2.30 Bn transactions in January 2021, which is just 3% higher than the 2.23 Bn transactions recorded in December 2020. The transaction volume also increased by 3% from INR 4.16 Lakh Cr to INR 4.31 Lakh Cr. To grow the digital payments ecosystem even further, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, during her Union Budget speech for 2021, has proposed to allocate INR 1,500 Cr to boost the penetration of digital payments as well as other measures to boost financial inclusion. Â
UPI is currently the most popular digital payments system in India, with more than 207 banks linked to it. In terms of third-party apps, PhonePe recorded 902.03 Mn transactions worth INR 1.82 Lakh Cr in December 2020. Google Pay stood at the second spot with 854.49 Mn transactions worth INR 1.76 Lakh Cr. It was followed by Paytm Payments Bank App with 256.36 Mn transactions worth INR 31.2K Cr. Looking at this massive growth, it will be hard to believe that UPI transactions had dipped below the billion mark in April in aftermath of Covid-induced lockdown and restrictions. Even before the market recorded, UPI started recording a steady growth and claiming the top spot in terms of digital payments.
- Realme Shipped 42 Million Smartphones In 2020Â
Chinese smartphone maker Realme on Monday announced that it had shipped 42 million smartphones and held a market share of 3% in 2020. The company revealed that it had scored the seventh spot in the global smartphone market and that it had been named as the fastest-growing brand of the year by Counterpoint Research in the final quarter of 2020. The same report by the research firm also said that Realme grew a whopping 65% year-on-year in shipment volume in Q4 2020. This is significantly less than 2019, however, this is owing to the Covid-19 pandemic which entailed an overall decline in smartphone shipments across the globe.Â
The Global Smartphone market declined 1% YoY in Q4 2020. However, the market rose 8% QoQ in Q4 2020, recovering from the global impact of COVID-19. Realme’s shipment grew from 25.7 million in 2019 t0 42.4 million in 2020. As far as the overall market share is concerned, it grew from 2% in 2019 to 3% in 2020. Realme said it aims to launch new 5G enabled smartphones and AIOT products enhancing the TechLife experience in the year 2021.
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