Author: Brett Venter

It’s a good time to be Chinese smartphone brand Xiaomi. Market research firm Canalys has issued its latest report on the African smartphone market and the Chinese company has increased its share of the smartphone market on the continent overall. That puts Xiaomi in third place. That might not be unexpected from a South African perspective, which tends to rank Samsung and Apple ahead of the Chinese contender but Apple, as a company, isn’t represented on the podium in Africa as a whole. African tastes When all of Africa’s countries are considered, Apple doesn’t rank in the top five for…

Leonardo da Vinci is a man of many talents. He created plans for objects that could only be built in the twentieth century (he died in 1519). He had a ninja turtle named after him. And he’s been immortalised in Lego. More than once, now. Lego is preparing a more technical rendition of one of da Vinci’s works. You can grab a version of the Mona Lisa that looks suspiciously like British comedian Jimmy Carr right now for R1,900 but if you wait a few weeks, you can get something a little more practical — Leo’s flying machine. Lego my…

South Africans will have fond memories of Huawei’s premium Mate lineup. The opportunity to make more memories should arise soon since the Chinese brand has unveiled its new Mate 70 handset. The announcement was made at an event in Shenzhen by Huawei Consumer Business Group Richard Yu, who claimed that this handset is “the most powerful Mate phone ever”. He wasn’t referring to all four models unveiled, of that we’re fairly certain. That accolade possibly belongs to the Huawei Mate 70 Ultimate Design. My new Mate 70 It could also belong to the Pro or Pro+ models announced alongside the…

If you’ve been paying attention to Huawei’s moves over the past few years, you’ll know that the Chinese brand has been distancing itself from former partners. This wasn’t the company’s first choice but it eventually led to the creation of Harmony OS. Huawei has revealed its ambitions for the operating system. In a bid for greater independence from… well, everyone, the company intends to expand the number of supported apps on Harmony OS. Huawei gonna do it? Presently there are some 15,000 apps available on Harmony OS. The company hopes to support several times that number before the end of…

Logistics is big business, and nobody knows that better than Amazon. But like everything else, you eventually run out of ways to increase efficiency. When that happens, you hit a wall but there are ways to stave off the impact. The retail giant is reported to be working on a way to make its deliveries just that much faster. How? Smart glasses are supposedly the answer, according to a report by Reuters. Delivery drivers will wear these and, in theory, speed up deliveries in the one place where a computer isn’t already involved. Augmented Amazon The project’s existence was confirmed…

You didn’t think consoles like the Xbox and PlayStation would escape the artificial intelligence assimilation, did you? Actually, Sony’s console might remain pure for a bit longer than Microsoft’s gaming hardware. The American company has gone all-in on AI and that involves cramming the technology into everything. The Xbox’s first encounter with the ‘future’ is a new AI-powered chatbot that will handle the platform’s tech support queries. Yup. That’s it. Except it’ll have a personality. So… totally unlike all those humans who used to handle the function for Microsoft. Xbox of tricks The Support Virtual Agent, as Microsoft is calling…

It’s almost inevitable that details of Samsung’s new phones will spill out long before launch but for once there’s something novel about the ‘leaks’. Talk of a Slim version of Samsung’s upcoming Galaxy S25 smartphone is bouncing around various online sources, starting in South Korea. In case you’ve neglected your South Korean language studies, website SmartPrix — which has a record of sharing Samsung stuff ahead of official reveals — has the details of the rumoured S25 Slim in English. Slim, neh? Or you could keep reading without bothering to click away. The handset is thought to be a fourth…

When you think of space-age materials, the same product that allowed the Phoenicians to dominate maritime culture more than 6,000 years ago doesn’t come to mind. And yet that’s the main component of the LignoSat, a new CubeSat from the Kyoto University that has just launched toward orbit. LignoSat’s name is based on lignum, the Latin name for ‘wood’. It’s a collaboration between Kyoto University and Sumitomo Forestry, a Japanese company focused on sustainable wood products. The point of the project isn’t just to promote what Sumitomo does, though it’s also that. It’s also to test just how effective wood…

Amazon’s Kindle is a fantastic device, no matter which of them you select, but unless you have sizable pockets, they’re not super-portable. The Mudita Kompakt, an eReader making the rounds on the crowdfunding circuit, hopes to be the reader you slip into your hip pocket. The Kompakt is more than ‘just’ an eReader. It performs a dual role by also functioning as a phone, albeit one with an e-Ink display. Those exist, of course, but they tend to be rather pricey. And unavailable in South Africa. Backing the Mudita Kompakt The smartphone/eReader will feature a 4.3in 800 x 480 e-ink…

Around the middle of 2024, there was talk about Canon’s upcoming EOS R7 lens. First previewed at Apple’s WWDC event, it’s finally more than a glint in the camera maker’s eye. It’s also a pricy option for a single-purpose lens that is only compatible with a single camera. American pricing puts the hardware’s cost at R8,000 or so ($450 before tax), so locals looking to shoot virtual reality with their Canon camera can expect to pay over R10,000. Virtually improves the EOS R7 Having the hardware official means it’s now possible to assign Canon’s lens a searchable name. Being Canon,…