Huawei Technologies Proposes Launch of SIM -Enabled Digital Photo Frames

Some interesting news is coming out of China-based Huawei Technologies: there are plans to launch Sim-card-enabled digital photo frames in Taiwan.

According to the DigiTimes, “Huawei has held talks with a number of telecom carriers in Taiwan, and some of the telecom operators may introduct SIM-enabled digital photo frames in Taiwan in the third quarter of this year. . . .”

Apparently, Huawei Technologies is currently in talks with several Taiwan companies and wants to launch SIM-enabled digital photo frames as soon as possible. Krunker.com tells us that “With mobile phones fast replacing home phones, it’s only natural to see more and more convergence among different consumer electronics. Combining a digital photo frame with mobile phone technology is similar to caller ID photos appearing on mobile phones themselves - except with much higher resolutions.”

Sounds like a great idea to me!

Interview with Steve Woo, Vice President of Sales, Viewsonic

Viewsonic is one of the most well-known and well-respected names in the display industry, and provides CRT and LCD monitors, projectors, and digital signage to businesses and individuals. It only makes sense that a well-established display company would consider getting into a new, emerging display market: digital picture frames.

Not that they’re ready to announce anything yet. Digitimes, an technology publication with close ties to many of the Asian manufacturers that source electronics products for US companies, recently reported that Viewsonic and HP were going to be entering the digital picture frame space soon.

We spoke to Steve Woo, Viewsonic’s vice president of sales, to find out what the story was. And though he couldn’t confirm Digitimes’ story, it sure sounds like Viewsonic will be selling digital picture frames soon.

Digitimes recently reported that Viewsonic would be offering a digital picture frame. Could you comment on that?
Viewsonic worldwide has been studying the marketplace as there’s been enormous quantity and variety of vendors coming into the (digital picture frame) marketplace. We see that there’s a growing quantity of units, and it looks like a marketplace that we want to take a look at seeing how we can utilize our strength in the panel industry, how we can migrate into this business space.

So that sounds like that you’re looking at moving into this space but aren’t ready to make a formal announcement yet. Is that a fair characterization?
That’s probably the best way to say it. What I can say is that in our Asian sister company we are starting to play in that marketplace already. We have put our toe in the water. I’m actually going back (to Asia) this week to look at our business plan on this particular product. If we jump into the marketplace in the Americas, we will jump in very quickly and we will utilize our buying power in LCDs, from the small 7-inch up to the 12-to-15-inch frames.
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CEIVA Digital Photo Frames Now Available at Staples, Nationwide!

This press release from CEIVA has exciting news for digital photo frame fans!

“CEIVA, the award-winning supplier of digital picture frames, today announced that its recently released CEIVA Digital Photo Framesâ„¢ will now be available for purchase at 1,400 Staples locations throughout the US, marking the company‘s first office superstore rollout.

With in-store product availability planned to coincide with the Father‘s Day and Graduation shopping season, US consumers visiting their local Staples retail store will be able to purchase a CEIVA Digital Photo Frame for the first time ever in an office superstore location. The CEIVA 7-inch Digital Photo Frameâ„¢ will be the first CEIVA frame introduced at Staples, followed by the CEIVA 8-inch Digital Photo Frameâ„¢ which will be part of a featured display in Staples stores for the June Father‘s Day sales campaign.

“We are thrilled to have our CEIVA Digital Photo Frames available to millions of consumers who regularly shop at Staples superstores,” said David Simon, Vice President of Business Development, at CEIVA. “Our product rollout with Staples showcases our commitment to making CEIVA Digital Photo Frames more widely available and to making it easier than ever for consumers to become part of the CEIVA digital photo experience.”

CEIVA Digital Photo Frames are the world‘s only fully connected digital picture frames, allowing users to instantly display digital photos from a built in memory card reader and from their PC over a home network. Using CEIVA‘s optional PicturePlan® service new digital photos can be sent from anywhere in the world and automatically delivered to any CEIVA frame. The CEIVA frames can connect to PicturePlan service over any ordinary phone line, broadband connection or wireless home network.

US shoppers will be able to go HERE and use the site‘s dealer locator to find the nearest Staples office superstore location to purchase CEIVA Digital Photo Frames.”

I know that I am far more inclined to purchase a new product if I can find it at a store I frequent. This move by CEIVA is a good one; I drive by our Staples store almost daily.

Can Thin, Flexible Frames Be Far Off?

If you read the high-tech/gadget websites, you may seen this week that Sony debtued an OLED, flexible TV screen. The little beaut is 2.5 inches and weighs less than 0.05 ounces!

Seeing this, I was immediately reminded of my article from a few weeks back about personal digital frames that might go inside wallets, lockets, or other small, personal items.

The debut of this kind of display seems to me to make the digital frames I speculated about much more likely. If your screen can bend and flex without damage, and still show an image, the applications of a digital frame become much broader.

Sony’s expecting to put these displays into use in TVs this year. Hopefully some enteprising frame marker will see the potential for these soon after and stretch the boundaries of the digital frame.