It was around this time one year ago that I became fascinated with the new product line of just-merged BenQ-Siemens. Sadly, the company had filed for bankruptcy a few weeks ago ending the one year reign of the East meets West partnership. Here is a short Q&A I posted at that time with an excerpt:

Our focus is on creating value with profitability before market share. We are targeting to achieve breakeven by the end of 2006. We will get there by:
- a market strategy exploiting complementary strengths of both brands in terms of multimedia, design, operator customization and market / …read more

You know, at the back of my mind I knew something like this would happen. Even if they made promising phone models like the S88, it wasn’t enough to sustain the merger of both companies. Damn, to think they almost survived for one year!

Even though BenQ and Siemens have managed to release several successful mobile phone models, market share of BenQ-Siemens combined was only 3.2% in Q2 2006, whereas Siemens’ market share in Q2 2005 was 4.8%, moreover, mobile phone shipments in Q2 2006 decreased by over 20% year-over-year, according to Gartner Research. Moreover, the German subsidiary continued to lose …read more

You know, despite the fact that this phone has a low resolution screen, no camera and really nothing much to brag about on the inside, it is the outside that really counts. Hello Mot— err .. Kitty!
I really wonder how much these things sell for when you brand them with Sanrio. But if you base statistics on this, well, BenQ-Siemens sure needs the help!

A friend of mine in retail asked whether the Benq-Siemens S88 was a top performer in the local market. With so many phones swimming on store sheleves, a new player in the phone industry, backed by several years of UGH (Siemens wasn’t exactly good with phones) makes me wonder how the hell its strengths can be highlighted.

Well two things have it going for the S88. First off, the OLED screen is something you don’t see in phones a lot. Heck, OLED is the new lamp! The screen is so bright, you would actually think the phone is a fake demonstration …read more

After talking about the P50, then comes the anticipated P51. There have been some small but significant upgrades to the new Windows Mobile 5.0 device.

The following features are included:
- a speech to text application (as well as the text to speech app which the P50 already has)
- upgrade of WLAN to 802.11g
- an optional GPS navigation module
- stereo sound and the ability to support AAC, AAC+
- best of all, the QWERTY thumb pad is now color coordinated to distinguish numbers from letters (I guess they read my post on thumb board design)
What I didn’t like was that the 1.3MP received …read more

Augh! My wireless life is a mess right now. In the past five days, the BenQ P50 I’ve been using was doing hard resets like anything during a call. What sucks is that BenQ doesn’t have a packaged backup solution (like iPAQ backup) so I can just restore on the fly. So there. Until I find a new firmware update or have the lemon changed, I’m going back to my trusty SE k700i.
What I liked:
The built-in universal remote is a neat little application which I use to change the channels of public televisions.
The speech recognizer allows me to do really …read more

UPDATE: Alas poor BenQ-Siemens we knew you well. Sadly, BenQ-Siemens is no more. Read more about it here. My friend in retail is now having a much harder time selling off the S88 after the company declared its last hurrah.
The S88 is BenQ-Siemens’ first flagship phone for 2006. It comes in two colors – black and white and from afar borrows a lot from the Sony Ericsson design. I was able to borrow the S88 for a few days and here is my hands on review.
The front of the unit real estate has the regular 0-9 keypad with two …read more

I had a chance to grab a sneak peek into the upcoming line of phones from BenQ-Siemens. Codenamed Pandora (in Asia), this phone is a prototype version of the new company’s music phone. I’m quite pleased with the way the new company is churning out sensible phones with attractive designs.

The Pandora has two modes. When it is closed, it serves as a digital music player. In fact, from afar it even looks like a Creative Zen micro.

When opened (as in ‘opening Pandora’s Box’), the phone reveals a small keypad that’s still amazingly easy to use. The back of the phone …read more

It’s Valentine’s Day once more and if you’re reading this tonight, then I’m assuming you had bad luck scoring a date. My condolences to you then. If it’s any consolation, I’d like to take this opportunity in cyberspace to tell you that all men are asses, while all women are too picky. Heh.
Today is the day of hearts, but it is also the day of remembering past heartaches as well. These “what could have beens” will always become the permeable stuff which we will bever be able to shut off from our minds. Now being a geek, I’ve had …read more

A lot of critics have been at it with BenQ and Siemens and how they are going to make an impact in the mobile phone industry.
In my previous post, I did a short preview of the BenQ-Siemens S88, their flagship release which is supposed to be the merger of Eastern form factor and Western technology. In any case, here’s an FAQ about the new BenQ-Siemens mobile.
How will BenQ turn around its mobile business?
We believe that the combination of Siemens and BenQ provides a great opportunity. Firstly BenQ has developed a cost-savings strategy with its strong relationship with Asian component …read more