All the sales have been done, the numbers have been crunched and the results are in from last year. It’s not a massive surprise but it has now been confirmed that Apple, with their iconic iPhone, were the top selling smartphone maker last year.

Not only that but they have also overtaken the mobile phone manufacturer LG as the 3rd largest mobile seller (all phones, not just smartphones) and they now have 19% of the market place.

There is no doubt that smartphones really are the future because word wide sales grew by 58%. Apparently 472 million of these all singing, all dancing mobile phones were sold in 2011.

The full report that I read from Gartner is full of facts and figures but the headlines are that the iPhone continues to be the smartphone of choice and poor old Nokia continue to struggle with their share of the market sliding again last year.

This comes as no real surprise to us here at Insurance2go as our most popular policy by far is the iPhone full cover policy. If you’ve got an iPhone and it isn’t presently insured you might want to check out our  iPhone insurance page. We’ve just added a comparison table so you can see how much our competitors charge.

Something called ‘Nomophobia’ was identified in 2008 which is apparently a fear of being out of mobile phone contact. Since 2008 it seems that more and more people have got it.

It’s not a massive surprise though especially now that mobile phones are being replaced with smart phones (like the iPhone) which can be used to check emails, look at facebook, send a tweet and all that sort of stuff.

According to a report out in the last couple of days 66% of mobile phone users are ‘terrified’ of being without their favourite gadget. This fear is so great that it seems that lots of people now have two or more mobiles just in case one gets stolen, lost or damaged. This was certainly the case in the survey as 41% said they had 2 or more.

You won’t be too shocked that we would recommend that if you are worried about being without your mobile you should consider mobile phone insurance. Here at Insurance2go we offer excellent value for money cover at a superb price.

The big rumour going round the tech sites and blogs is that the Apple iPad 3 could well be launching on the 7th March. As far as we know this is the first time a specific date has been mentioned but the month of March had been discussed before.

So what can Apple fans expect from the new iPad 3? That of course is if the new tablet is actually called an iPad 3. It wasn’t that long ago that millions of people (including us) were wrong footed when Apple’s new phone was an iPhone 4s and not an iPhone 5!

But assuming it is called the iPad 3 the geeks in the know reckon it could come with a bigger and better battery and an improved camera. This on top of a possible quad-core chip type thing and who knows maybe even a 2048 x 1536 retina display, I can hardly wait!

The good news from an insurance point of view is that here at good old Insurance2go we are ready and waiting for the launch of the iPad 3 and we’ve even put together an iPad 3 page on our website. This means 2 things – 1. As soon as you get your hands on your new tablet you can insure it with us. 2. If Apple call it something else we will have to put together a new page, but regardless of the name we will still be able to offer you insurance.

Just click on this link Apple iPad3 Insurance and fingers crossed we aren’t all wrong footed again!

Google, the search engine giant, has been given a green light from regulators in Europe and the US to proceed with its bid for Motorola, the US based mobile and telecoms manufacturer. The move is a very interesting one as Google will not only buy a manufacturer and the infrastructure that comes with this, but it will also benefit by picking up the 17,000 patents owned by Motorola, there are also another 7,000 applications being processed by the company. The number of patents now in place in the mobile industry would make life almost impossible for a new entrant into the mobile market from being able to design a mobile to compete with the iconic iPhone, Samsung’s Galaxy range, HTC and Nokia’s Lumia.

Motorola is still a brand to be reckoned with in the US where it is still thought of as a big player, this is less so in Europe and Asia. In the early days of the mobile industry Motorola was a leading player with it’s Startac flip phone range.

The move will open up the market for Google to enter the mobile market in a more serious manner, and given their dominance in the search engine sector this will make other manufacturers sit up and take notice. Google will be able to use this dominance to build up advertising revenues and increase synergies around mobile searching.

Did you know that Samsung have sold 30 million Tocco Lite mobile phones worldwide? Well apparently they have so just like when film studios have a hit on their hands and produce a version 2 (Jaws 2, The Godfather Part 2, Spiderman 2) so it seems do mobile phone handset manufacturers like Samsung.

To be honest with 30 million sales in the bag you can’t really blame them!

So in March 2012 customers should be able to buy the Samsung Tocco Lite 2 here in the UK. Just like a lot of phones these days it is designed to help customers who want to keep up to date with facebook, twitter and all that type of social networking carry on. It is also quite good for gaming, sharing multimedia content and browsing so the nice people at Samsung tell us in their press release.

I’ve been told it’s even got a 3 inch QVGA screen, yes you did read that right – QVGA!

Anyway just like any other super duper new smart phone you will be very cheesed off if you lose it, have it nicked by a naughty person or drop it in the bath so if you want a happier life don’t forget to pop along to our website at www.insurance2go.co.uk and get it insured.

A Student at Middlesex University has designed a Smartphone made from Bamboo. Keiron Scott-Woodhouse of Shepherds Bush said he designed the handset because he was frustrated that so many handsets look the same.

The new handset will be called the ‘ADzero’ and will launch later this year. The ‘ADzero’ operates using Google Andoid OS and will be half the weight of an iPhone.

Here at Insurance2go we are pleased to announce that from today (1st February 2012) our iPad Insurance has been reduced in price to make it even more competitive.

We haven’t reduced the level of cover so our iPad insurance policy still covers Theft, Accidental Damage, Water Damage, Fire Damage, Worldwide Cover, Accessory Cover (up to £150) and Cover for your Immediate Family (if over the age of 18).

We cover all of the different models of iPad and iPad2 – WIFI/ 3G/ 16gb/32gb & 64gb.

All models apart from the most expensive 3G 64gb iPad2 cost just £4.49 a month or £49.99 for 12 months worth of cover. The 3G 64gb iPad2 costs just a little bit more at £4.81 a month or £52.72 a year.

Apparently Apple have already sold 25 million iPads worldwide so we are expecting our iPad Insurance to be very popular and with the must have tablet computer costing up to £659, replacing one without insurance would be rather painful.

Nokia, the Finnish mobile phone manufacturer, has reported losses of 945 euros for the quarter to December 31st 2011, Sales were 21% down on the same period last year. Despite selling a very tidy 113.5 million handsets only 19 million of these were smartphones. Sales in units were 8% down on 2010.

Nokia have found life increasingly difficult since the heady days when they had a massive market share and were the market leader by a country mile. Competition from Apple, Samsung, HTC in particular have made life increasing tough. There is some good news. Sales of the Lumia are strong and it is hoped that this flagship model will improve the company’s position as we move through 2012.

Phones4U will be the first to stock the new LG Prada mobile phone. The handset has been made in conjunction with the Italian fashion house and does look amazing.

Sadly, Alpha Telecom have ceased trading and have called in administrators.

Apple’s success seems to be continuing a pace with records profits for q4 of last year. The company have announced that they made a profit of £8.35 billion in the last quarter of 2011 compared to £3.84 billion in the same period in 2010.

This success was down to the sales of a staggering 37 million iPhones and over 15 million iPads.

Wow – pretty amazing stuff. The company is neck and neck with Exon to become the USA’s largest company.

It looks very likely that the brand ‘Orange’ will disappear from the UK. The move will occur when Everything Everywhere who own Orange in the UK, along with T-Mobile, get rid of the two brands and promote the Everything Everywhere brand to replace them. Whilst the t-Mobile brand will probably not be missed by many, Orange on the other hand was one of the most successful brand launches  in UK corporate history.

The brand was launched in 1994 and used the mystery of a clever but simple slogan to gain prominence. The slogan ‘The future’s bright the futures Orange’ became somewhat iconic and much impersonated. Orange was launched by Hutchison telecom as a new player in the digital mobile phone revolution. The company floated in 1996 only to be purchased by Mannesmann in 1,999. The German company then sold Orange onto France Telecom in 2,000. In 2009 Orange merged with T-Mobile to form Everything Everywhere, the company initially said that both brands would continue under the EE umbrella, now this position has changed.

The change will cost millions, stores, shops, advertising websites, letterheads etc will all have to be changed. Some analysts are suggesting that this is a bad decision given how successful the brand has been.

Even on a smaller scale the cost of changing brands here at Insurance2go was significant when older brands of iphone insurance were brought under the insurance2go.co.uk umbrella.