MacRumors

The Wall Street Journal reports that Apple is facing shortages of the lithium-polymer batteries used in its iPod line, as a Japanese supplier has been forced to shut down its facilities following the earthquake there earlier this month.

A representative from Apple Inc. recently called Kureha Corp.'s offices in the U.S. The problem: Apple was facing tight supplies of lithium-ion batteries used in its popular iPods, and they traced the supply bottleneck to the relatively obscure Japanese chemicals maker.

Kureha, which has a 70% share of the global market for a crucial polymer used in lithium-ion batteries, had to shut its factory in Iwaki -- near the quake's epicenter -- after the March 11 disaster struck. It is the only place where Kureha makes this particular polymer.

The development has increased the urgency with which Kureha is seeking to diversify its production beyond Japan to include the United States and China, but such efforts will not be able to ease near-term shortages.

According to the report, Kureha's facility in Iwaki escaped the disasters relatively unscathed, but extensive damage to the port nearby has prevented deliveries of materials needed to manufacture the polyvinylidene fluoride polymer from reaching the plant. No estimate for reopening the factory has been provided.

It is unclear why only Apple's iPod line is cited in the report, as virtually identical lithium-polymer batteries are used in the iPhone and iPad. Similar technology is also used in Apple's notebook batteries, although those units may not utilize the pliable polymer manufactured by Kureha in their construction.

A new report issued today by research firm IDC is gaining significant attention for its bold prediction that Microsoft's Windows Phone platform will surpass the iPhone in worldwide smartphone market share by 2015. The report cites the partnership between Nokia and Microsoft as being key to Windows Phone's performance, which is unsurprisingly projected to come at the expense of Nokia's own Symbian operating system that will be phased out.

Nokia's recent announcement to shift from Symbian to Windows Phone will have significant implications for the smartphone market going forward. "Up until the launch of Windows Phone 7 last year, Microsoft has steadily lost market share while other operating systems have brought forth new and appealing experiences," added Llamas. "The new alliance brings together Nokia's hardware capabilities and Windows Phone's differentiated platform. We expect the first devices to launch in 2012. By 2015, IDC expects Windows Phone to be number 2 operating system worldwide behind Android."

As for the iPhone, IDC sees the device averaging growth of 18.8% per year between 2011 and 2015, but that growth rate is predicted to be slightly lower than the overall smartphone market's growth of 19.6%. Consequently, IDC predicts that Apple's share of the smartphone market will slip slightly from 15.7% this year to 15.3% in 2015, although iOS is predicted to remain ahead of Research in Motion's BlackBerry operating system, which is predicted to slip from 14.9% to 13.7% of the market over the same period.

Just days after the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) ruled that Apple has not violated any of five patents cited by Nokia in a complaint filed in October 2009, Nokia has turned around and filed a second complaint against Apple with the ITC. The complaint cites seven Nokia-held patents as being infringed by "virtually all" Apple products.

The seven Nokia patents in the new complaint relate to Nokia's pioneering innovations that are now being used by Apple to create key features in its products in the areas of multi-tasking operating systems, data synchronization, positioning, call quality and the use of Bluetooth accessories.

This second ITC complaint follows the initial determination in Nokia's earlier ITC filing, announced by the ITC on Friday, March 25. Nokia does not agree with the ITC's initial determination that there was no violation of Section 337 in that complaint and is waiting to see the full details of the ruling before deciding on the next steps in that case.

Nokia notes that it now has 46 patents at stake against Apple, many of them dating back to as much as ten years or more before the introduction of the iPhone. Most of those patents are already being litigated in cases underway in the United States and several European countries as the dispute between Apple and Nokia continues to escalate.

TechCrunch has posted another lengthy report detailing what it is hearing about Apple's plans for the fifth-generation iPhone and iOS 5, now both rumored for release closer to a "fall" timeframe than the traditional June/July timeframe seen in past years.

Perhaps the most notable information comes at the end of the article, revealing that sources have said that Apple's April 2010 acquisition of personal assistant software company Siri is set to bear fruit in the form of "deeply integrated" artificial intelligence and voice control for iOS 5, a change that could potentially transform the way iOS devices are used.

A year ago, Apple bought Siri, a virtual personal assistant startup that had released a very cool iPhone app. The Siri team and technology are now said to be a big part of iOS 5.

The use of Siri's artificial intelligence and assistance technology is said to be deeply integrated into the OS for all the different services offered. And the team is now putting the finishing touches on the elements that will be demoed at WWDC, we hear. This tech may also be opened to developers for use in third-party apps - though that information isn't quite as concrete.

The report also notes that a fall release for new iPhone hardware provides Apple with additional time to incorporate LTE 4G capabilities, speculating that a desire to add LTE may even be the reason for the shift in release schedule compared to past years.

TechCrunch contributor Steve Cheney (who nailed the timing of the Verizon iPhone last year), believes that a fall iPhone 5 launch makes LTE much more likely. He currently puts the odds at zero to ten percent for LTE if the iPhone 5 launched this summer (again, not happening), 50 percent if it comes in the fall, and 100 percent if it comes in January.

A fall timeframe would give Apple a more vetted and lower power Qualcomm chip for LTE, Cheney says. When the Verizon iPhone was unveiled in January, Apple COO Tim Cook addressed the LTE issue directly. "The first generation LTE chipsets force some design compromises. Some of which we would not make," he said. If Cheney is right, that may not be such an issue later this year.

The report notes that Apple waited to adopt 3G technology until is had significantly matured, opting to release the original iPhone as an EDGE-only device despite relatively widespread 3G coverage available at the time. But at that time the iPhone was a completely new concept for smartphones setting the stage to remake the industry regardless of whether it was an EDGE or 3G device. In the much larger and much more competitive smartphone market today, Android devices are already moving to LTE and Apple may not wish to wait until mid-2012 to introduce its own LTE iPhone.

Amazon today unveiled a pair of cloud-based offerings designed to allow users to store music and other digital content in the cloud and to play cloud-hosted music tracks via players for the Web and on Android.

Amazon Cloud Drive is the new storage service, with the company offering users 5 GB of space free of charge. Additional capacity is available through paid plans at six different tiers priced at a uniform $1 per GB per year, starting at 20 GB ($20) and ranging up to 1000 GB ($1000).

As a bonus offer, customers who purchase an album from the Amazon MP3 Store before December 31st will receive a free one-year upgrade to the 20 GB level. In addition, any music content purchased through the Amazon MP3 Store and stored in Amazon Cloud Drive does not count toward a user's storage limit.

Amazon Cloud Player is the mechanism by which music stored in Amazon Cloud Drive can be played. The company offers a Web player compatible with Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome and Safari, targeting both PCs and Macs. In addition, Amazon offers a downloadable app for Android devices to allow content to played on the mobile platform. Other mobile platforms such as iOS, BlackBerry, and Windows Phone are not supported, and the Web player does not function under iOS, rendering Apple's mobile devices incompatible with the service.

Apple has been rumored to be developing its own cloud-based "digital locker" solution focused on music and perhaps video, reportedly coming as a revamp to the company's MobileMe services. According to one recent report, Apple has finally reached a deal with Warner Brothers to permit the cloud-based storage and is pushing to get other labels to fall in line for an April launch of the new service, said to be priced at $20 per year for an undisclosed amount of storage space.

Less than 12 hours after passes went on sale, Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference set for June 6th-10th has already sold out.

Last year's edition sold out in eight days, and brisk sales were expected again this year, but a complete sellout within a matter of hours may still have taken some developers planning on attending by surprise. This year marks the fourth straight year that WWDC has sold out.

Alongside today's announcement that its Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) will be held June 6th-10th in San Francisco, Apple also revealed details on its Apple Design Awards competition, a program designed to recognize applications that "set the standard for excellence" on Apple's platforms.

Apple received a significant amount of criticism last year for its decision not to offer Apple Design Awards for Mac OS X applications, choosing instead to simply offer awards in iPad and iPhone categories, although the move was apparently simply because Apple wasn't prepared to begin showing off Mac OS X Lion at that time and thus focused the event primarily on iOS.

Mac developers will be glad to know that Apple has added Mac OS X applications back into the Apple Design Awards this year, preparing to honor applications on both Mac OS X and iOS platforms. One catch, however, is that applications must be included in the App Store by May 23rd in order to be eligible for an award.

Does an app have to be on the App Store to be considered?

Apps must be available on the App Store by May 23, 2011, to be considered for an Apple Design Award.

While the App Store requirement is taken for granted when it comes to iOS applications, it is significant that it is also being applied to Mac OS X applications given the Mac App Store's relatively recent introduction and myriad of other means of application distribution available to developers. From Apple's perspective, limiting entries to applications found in the Mac App Store is a good way to continue pushing the marketplace forward, encouraging developers of quality applications to bring their products to the store.

A MacRumors reader has just sent us the above photo claimed to be of an internal notice from RadioShack announcing that the retailer will begin carrying the iPad 2 at 500 of its locations around the United States as of tomorrow.

We are thrilled that iPad 2 will be available at 500 RadioShack locations across the country starting March 29! Details have been sent to these stores.

Apple has struggled to meet early demand for the iPad 2, both in the United States and in the over two dozen other countries that saw the device launch on Friday. Shipping estimates for new online orders remain at 3-4 weeks in all of Apple's online stores, and stock coming into retail stores has been very limited, although improving somewhat in recent days. With RadioShack adding another 500 distribution points for the device, further strains may be placed on Apple's supplies, although presumably the company has selected tomorrow for the new rollout based on projections of continued improvement in availability.

Update: Representatives at multiple RadioShack locations have confirmed that they are scheduled to begin offering the iPad 2 tomorrow, although launch stocks are currently unknown.

In what would likely be a major surprise to many Apple followers, The Loop's Jim Dalrymple reports that Apple is not planning to introduce any new hardware at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference, scheduled for June 6th through 10th. The conference has been consistently used to introduce new iPhone hardware over the last several years, with the company occasionally introducing other hardware as well.

Apple closed the door this morning on any speculation that it would announce new hardware at its Worldwide Developers conference saying it would focus on iOS and Mac OS.

Apple's apparent focus on software in its WWDC announcement backs up what my own sources are saying about the annual conference. That is, expect a software show in 2011, not a hardware event.

While a focus on software is not unusual for Apple's WWDC promotional materials given its primary positioning as an event for developers, Dalrymple notes that the 2011 materials do nothing to contradict what he has already been hearing from sources: namely, no new hardware this year.

It is also important to note that Dalrymple has not specifically claimed that new iPhone hardware won't be introduced in the same general timeframe as WWDC, merely claiming that any introduction won't occur at the event itself.

One analyst report from late last month indicated that a September launch for the fifth-generation iPhone seemed to be the likely scenario. Those rumors were turned into claims of "delays" that were refuted by Dalrymple himself and other sources. The difference may have been in semantics, however, as Dalrymple simply noted at the time that Apple had not deviated from its own internal release schedule plans, but whether those plans called for a typical June release or something more in line with the September rumors or even something else entirely was unknown.

Update: Japanese blog Mac Otakara reports that the fifth-generation iPhone will "probably" not ship until 2012 based on the current status of part production.

According to Chinese source, iPhone 5 will not probablly be shipped during 2011 because the parts manufacturing for iPhone 5 are not started.

The site had previously offered relatively accurate information about the iPad 2. The site also reported earlier this month that the fifth-generation iPhone will adopt an aluminum back and a redesigned antenna.

Update 2: Mac Otakara has clarified its original report to note that the fifth-generation iPhone is apparently not set to ship before the end of Apple's fiscal 2011, which occurs in late September 2011.

Update 3: All Things Digital and Engadget are hearing similar claims that there will be no fifth-generation iPhone introduction at WWDC 2011.

Apple today announced that it will hold its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) from June 6th-10th at the Moscone West convention center in San Francisco. Conference passes are on sale now for $1599, and are expected to sell out quickly given past years' trends.

"At this year's conference we are going to unveil the future of iOS and Mac OS," said Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. "If you are an iOS or Mac OS X software developer, this is the event that you do not want to miss."

Apple notes that it will hold over 100 technical sessions for developers, with over 1,000 Apple engineers on hand to provide support for attendees.

Apple unsurprisingly is billing the event as being for both iOS and Mac OS X developers equally, following last year's conference that saw a heavy emphasis on iOS development. Mac OS X is of course set to receive greater prominence this year due to the impending release of Mac OS X Lion.

The dates for WWDC 2011 do in fact nearly correspond to a "corporate meeting" discovered on the Moscone Center's event calendar in early February and suspected of representing the conference. The dates also match with a tentative multi-year convention calendar published by the San Francisco Convention and Visitors Bureau in April 2010.

TechCrunch reports that Apple may be departing from its usual pattern of releasing major new iOS releases alongside new iPhone hardware in the June-July timeframe, instead pushing iOS 5 to a release in the fall, potentially with an initial unveiling at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference.

Many people (including myself) were a bit disappointed that Apple didn't devote any time during the iPad 2 unveiling to talking about iOS 5, the next major revamp of the software. But there may be a very good reason for that: it's not coming anytime soon. In fact, the plan right now is to wait to launch iOS 5 until the fall, we've heard from two solid sources.

With the later timeframe for the iOS launch and Apple potentially waiting until WWDC to offer the first glimpse at it, the company would presumably forgo its usual April media event where it has traditionally introduced developers to the major updates to give them time to update their apps for the public launch a few months later. One report from earlier this month had claimed that Apple would be holding such an event in early April, but TechCrunch indicates that this is unlikely to take place.

According to the sources for the report, iOS 5 will be a major update implementing the long-rumored cloud-based hosting for music, videos, and photos, as well as some new services such as location-based offerings. The fall release would reportedly also coincide with the release of a third-generation iPad.

The report offers no specific information on the fate of an iPhone update and whether that could also be pushed back to the fall timeframe, but the presumption is that Apple will follow its usual schedule with a fifth-generation iPhone release in June or July, but shipping with a version of iOS 4 ahead of the iOS 5 release a few months later.

TechCrunch reports that Apple is preparing to seed the first golden master candidate version of Mac OS X Lion to developers. While Apple may yet issue several such candidates before reaching the final version to be released to consumers, the candidate designation would suggest that Apple has essentially completed development on the new operating system version and will simply be fixing bugs that crop up at the last minute during the testing process.

Specifically, Apple is gearing up to deploy an OS X Lion update to developers that they may be classifying as the "GM1" release, we've heard. "GM" or "Golden Master" is a title reserved for software that is complete. But from what we've heard, this is only the initial Golden Master candidate. In other words, don't get too excited just yet.

Apple first previewed Mac OS X Lion at its "Back to the Mac" media event in October, and the company released a developer preview version just over a month ago. The company has stated that it plans to release Mac OS X Lion this "summer", and TechCrunch's report suggests that the launch could occur relatively early in that timeframe following a formal introduction at Apple's annual Worldwide Developers Conference.

In case there was any doubt about the increased horsepower found in the iPad 2, our sister site Touch Arcade has posted a video demonstrating a forthcoming update to Firemint's Real Racing 2 HD that will bring support for full 1080p video out while also driving a separate display on the iPad itself.

Using the video out feature of an iPad 2, Real Racing 2 HD will be able to be displayed on a big screen in full 1080p resolution while the device's 10-inch touchscreen shows a track map and race statistics.

This is the first indication we've seen of an iOS game taking advantage of the iPad 2's ability to render out at a full 19201080 HD resolution. On an HDTV, Real Racing 2 HD will run full screen with no black borders and at native 1080p resolution, without scaling.

According to Firemint, Real Racing 2 HD runs at a "silky smooth" 30 frames per second in this mode with precision control for a more console-like gaming experience than ever. Apple has touted the iPad 2 as offering up to twice the CPU performance and up to nine times the graphics performance of its predecessor, opening the door for significantly improved app performance, particularly when it comes to fast-action gaming titles.

While the iPad 2 now offers users the option to output content through the TV out adapters in 1080p via upscaling, Real Racing 2 HD appears to be the first app set to debut the combination of native 1080p video out while driving a second display on the iPad itself.

It is unknown exactly when the new feature will make its debut, as Firemint has only said that it is coming in the "next major update" to Real Racing 2 HD.

Reuters reports that the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) has issued a decision in the patent dispute between Apple and Nokia, ruling that Apple has not violated any of five patents cited by Nokia in its lawsuit.

Apple Inc (AAPL.O) won a round in its patent battle with Nokia (NOK1V.HE) on Friday as a U.S. trade panel ruled that the U.S. company did not violate any of five Nokia patents.

The patents were for electronic devices, including mobile phones, portable music players and computers.

Nokia initially filed suit against Apple in October 2009, and the two companies have escalated the situation by filing countersuits and new suits citing an increasing number of patents and in a number of jurisdictions. Most recently, Nokia filed four new suits targeting Apple in European courts.

ITC staff have already issued a preliminary position siding with Nokia regarding Apple's countersuit claiming patent infringement, but an agency judge has yet to issue an official ruling on that case.