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Bankrupt BenQ Mobile hits parent BenQ with third lawsuit
As if there wasn't enough scandal surrounding the bankruptcy of BenQ Mobile, the dead handset company has just filed its third lawsuit since July against former parent company BenQ. This time BenQ Mobile's insolvency administrator Martin Prager wants €26 million Euro ($36 million US) to pay executive bonuses that BenQ the parent approved, but BenQ Mobile had to pay after BenQ pulled the investment plug. In July Prager filed two lawsuits that amounted to €80 million ($110 million US) for account payables made by BenQ Mobile to BenQ in 2006. BenQ's considering counterclaims against those July suits.
BenQ changes it up and spins off the brand, keeps manufacturing
Fighting hard to stay alive after the BenQ Mobile fiasco, BenQ has switched things up by deciding to spin off its BenQ brand and hold onto its manufacturing business, instead of doing things the other way around as most analysts expected. According to BenQ chairman K.Y. Lee, it was a bit of a no-brainer: "The scale of the branded business has become relatively small compared to our integrated manufacturing service business. Therefore, it is a straightforward decision to spin-off the branded business." Lee will be leading both companies, with the manufacturing arm -- which does contract work for heavyweights such as Dell and HP, and accounts for 60 percent of BenQ revenue -- taking on the new name of "Jia Da Corp." after the spin-off. The new, fabless BenQ will stick to product design and engineering, while Jia Da Corp. will try to make its buck in the cut-throat world of ODM, something which Lee once dismissed as a viable way to survive. Arguably, BenQ couldn't be doing much worse than it's doing right now, so we're content to sit and watch how it all plays out.
Ronaldo to BenQ Mobile: I wanna get paid
Brazilian soccer star Ronaldo has a beef to pick with BenQ Mobile, a sponsor of the Real Madrid soccer team. The problem? BenQ Mobile has filed bankruptcy and Ronaldo wants his, umm, cash. While we're quite sure celebrity endorsements are fine and dandy, perhaps Ronaldo's contract should have stipulated payment up front. Regardless, the European soccer sensation is looking for at least 20 percent of what he agreed to in the BenQ Mobile endorsement contract. With former employees of BenQ Mobile sitting on the bench with owed monies as well, Ronaldo may be waiting a while for his cut.[Via I4U News, thanks to Ali and Number_42 for the corrections]
BenQ CEO offers to quit, told to stay
BenQ has certainly seen more than a few problems as of late, recently catching some heat for a tasteless ad campaign, not to mention running into a whole mess of trouble with its short-lived mobile phone subsidiary. Now, Infoworld is reporting that the financial losses caused by those latter problems have prompted BenQ CEO K.Y. Lee to offer his resignation. The company's board of directors appears to be having none of that, however, with them instead demanding that Lee stay in his job and try to turn BenQ's problematic situation around. The board also looks to be trying to get to the bottom of just how much the failed acquisition of Siemens's mobile division actually cost the company, with them set to form a task force to review and report on all losses related to the acquisition.
BenQ Mobile to divide, be sold in pieces
'Tis a sad day for those at BenQ Mobile, as the Munich-based company will reportedly be split up and sold after failing to turn around the struggling unit it acquired from Siemens AG. Honestly though, this shouldn't come as any major surprise, as the endeavor has already had its plug pulled and suffered through an investigation into its bankruptcy filing, so it's simply following the unfortunately necessary series of events as its dwindles into oblivion. The outfit's insolvency administrator announced that there would be "no realistic chance" of it being sold off as a whole, but didn't elaborate on exactly which portions would be segmented for bidding. Furthermore, it's suggested that "nearly all of the 3,000 jobs" at the division would vanish, but at least 550 have purportedly already found employment in other areas. I guess we should now cue the sappy background music as we sneak a peek at BenQ mobiles that could have been, but sadly never were never will be.
BenQ-Siemens' SL80 offers "feminine luxury"
Siemens' SL75 slider is all growed up now, and besides adding 5 to the model number, the SL80 (now by BenQ-Siemens, of course) seems to have developed an affinity for the fairer sex. Unlike its older sibling, the SL80 is only available in the decidedly feminine "Mauve Sensation," and BenQ is pulling no punches in saying the phone is aimed squarely at women. Skimming through the specs, it seems to be a modest upgrade from the SL75, offering an identical shell and button layout, the same tri-band GSM and EDGE support, 1.3-megapixel camera, 52MB of internal memory, Bluetooth, and music player. In fact, the more we look, the more it seems the SL80 is just a pink SL75. The boys among us are feeling far less excluded now than they were a few minutes ago; as for the ladies, you can pick up your own Mauve Sensation starting in October.[Via Slashphone]
BenQ P50 gets a (belated) review
Suffering from one of the most excruciatingly long, drawn-out releases in smartphone history, BenQ's, uh, Treo 600-killing P50 had already fallen behind the pack by the time it made it to the masses. That being said, it's still a unique Windows Mobile device -- albeit 2003 Second Edition -- and worthy of an in-depth review, especially considering its quadband GSM capability. MobileTechReview's done the honors for us here, noting that the P50 is bundled with an array of high-quality accessories, including a screen protector (hallelujah). Build quality was found to be impressive, as was size, though anyone migrating from a Treo will find little difference there. The P50's 416MHz XScale satisfies the speed demon in us in ways most other Pocket PC phones have not, but the 128MB combined ROM and RAM is a disappointment -- a complaint the P51 happily addresses. In the end, MobileTechReview finds the P50's flaws too great to justify the cost of admission. With nothing but GPRS for data, we agree, especially with a successor waiting in the wings.
BenQ-Siemens adds trio of handsets
In the event Europeans are still unhappy with their selection of 3G-capable devices, BenQ's trying to come to the rescue this week, showing their UMTS SL91 slider and E81 candybar -- along with the more pedestrian EDGE-only E71. All three handsets share some visual cues, sporting glossy black finishes and rounded lines, though the similarities mostly end there; potentially most interesting of the three is the SL91, a Chocolate-esque, "mysteriously opaque" device featuring the LG phone's now-trademark disappearing navigation keys. Besides UMTS, the SL91 goes big with a 3.2-megapixel camera, QVGA display, and FM radio with RDS. One notch down the food chain is the E81, giving up some screen real estate with its 220 x 176 display and trading 3.2 megapixels for the more standard 1.3, but mercifully hanging on to the microSD slot. Finally, the EDGE-only E71 steps back up to QVGA, but the real draw here should be its "innovative non-stick coating" that promises to hide fingerprints on its shiny exterior. All three phones look to drop before the year's out, though odds are slim Americans are invited to the party. That's alright, BenQ; we prefer our phones good and smudged with fingerprints, anyway.[Via Reg Hardware]
