TOI Gadgets Now Awards; Samsung Galaxy M10 and M20 launch; RComm files for bankruptcy and other top tech news of the week

This has been an exciting week in the world of technology news and for us, this has been a special week as well. Team Gadgets Now hosted its first technology awards dubbed as the Times of India Gadgets Now awards. Also, you will have to brace yourself for paying more for shopping online. And not to forget, Anil Ambani’s Reliance Communications is giving up and has decided to opt for insolvency. These and more, here are the top technology news of the week.

The Times of India recently hosted its first ‘Gadgets Now Awards’ in Gurgaon. The event was attended by top executives from almost all technology majors which includes Samsung, Google, Microsoft, HMD Global, Fitbit, Huawei, Amazon India and others. The Gadgets Now Awards honour and celebrate the finest devices that were launched during 2018.

Reliance Communications has decided to opt for insolvency proceedings following its failure to sell assets for paying back its lenders, the Anil Ambani-led telecom firm said. RCom even failed to sell spectrum to Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio, a deal that was expected to bring some relief to the cash-strapped company. It is estimated that RCom has been reeling under debt of over Rs 46,000 crore.

Samsung has finally launched its much-awaited M series of smartphones in India in the form of Galaxy M10 and Galaxy M20. Both the smartphones are made in India and are aimed exclusively at the domestic market. The both smartphones are also the first from Samsung to feature notch displays, which otherwise, Samsung likes to call “Infinity V” displays. Both the smartphones — Galaxy M10 and Galaxy 20 — take on the likes of Xiaomi, Realme, Honor and other Chinese smartphones.

If you are shopping online then you will now have to wait at least 4-7 days for the deliveries to arrive as compared to 1-2 days earlier, and pay relatively more, after the new e-commerce FDI policy took effect.

The impact is especially felt on Amazon, which has removed a significant amount of products from its platform across categories like mobile, electronics, grocery and fashion, among others. Sellers like Cloudtail and Appario (where Amazon is a JV partner) have almost become nonexistent on the platform. After Amazon’s December quarter earnings on Friday, company CFO Brian Olsavsky told analysts the new policy will hit pricing and selection for consumers as well as sellers in India.

Chinese smartphone maker Vivo has already sent media invites for the launch of a new Vivo smartphone with a pop-up selfie camera. The invite, however did not reveal the name of the upcoming smartphone. Now, a poster of Vivo V15 and Vivo V15 Pro has appeared online in a post on Twitter.

According to teasers, the handsets are ‘coming soon’ to India. It also specifies a 32-megapixel popup selfie camera. However, the post does not reveal about which of the two smartphone will offer the popup camera.

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) recently announced new tariff regime for cable and DTH operators. These new regulations come into effect from today and mean new rates for the TV channels. As per the new rules, DTH operators like Tata Sky, Airtel, Dish, Hathway and others can no longer offer different rates for same channels. All channels have fixed rates.

HMD Global the company which hold the license to manufacturer Nokia branded smartphones has now launched the 6GB RAM and 128GB internal storage variant of Nokia 8.1. The smartphone is successor to the last year launched Nokia 7 Plus and it comes with a price tag of Rs 26,999. At this price point the smartphone will face competition from the Oppo R15 Pro and Asus Zenfone 5Z smartphones.

Chinese smartphones brand Huawei is going to hold its MWC keynote on 24th Feb February where it is expected to showcase its 5G-enabled foldable phone. The launch invite shows a V-shaped device emitting light on the outer side — which could be representing the two screens — joined by (what seems to be) a flexible hinge