Social Games Developer gets $12.5 million investment
SNS Plus, a 3-year-old developer of games that run on social media sites has just received an influx of funding amounting to $12.5 million from WI Harper, a Chinese VC, and Matrix Partners. SNS focuses on developing for Facebook with 60 games already available on that platform and an additional 15 games on a variety of others including Friendster, Zingme and Apple’s iOS. The company currently focuses on the Asian market and has offices in China, Taiwan and Thailand.

Android apps revenue trails iOS- Wait until next year!
Last week we noted that a study be market research firm Piper Jaffray said that Apple iOS app developers were racking in the funds while their counterparts in the Android space were just getting crumbs.

Now Inside Mobile Apps has refuted the estimate claiming that it is flawed. In particular it notes that free apps have a strong revenue generating potential by in-app sales. While we don’t track this thing, it seemed at the time that Piper Jaffray’s estimates were too low. It will be interesting to follow this space as the analysts start to develop real tools that can provide developers with the information they need to profitably allocate their resources.

Panasonic’s US Android plans: Someday?
It looks like Panasonic Mobile Communications Co. will be bringing a lineup of smartphones to Europe as it seeks to establish itself as a player in the Android-powered smartphone space. According to a report from the Nikkei that was forwarded by Reuters the company seeks to sell 7.5 million phones in that market, half of its output, but not until 2015.

It will look at further expansion down the road into the US and additional Asian markets. The company dropped out of all but its own domestic mobile phone space in 2005 due to a variety of issues including tough price competition.

Apple dumping Samsung LCDs?
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Apple is moving to a new partner for the displays in its forthcoming next generation iPads. The company will be moving from Samsung Electronics, a company it has partnered with in the display space for some time.

The report, well actually more of a rumor, claims that the LCDs will come from Sharp and that Apple is also investing an undisclosed sum in Sharp’s panel manufacturing facilities in Japan.

This seems to be a trend by Apple and you have to wonder if it has issues with Samsung? It was reported in September that it was moving away from using Samsung memory components. Earlier this year it moved away from using Samsung’s manufacturing for its processors that power its devices. Think that the patent disputes between the two have any impact on these decisions?

Did Apple products really account for 10 percent of Black Friday online sales?
A story coming out from electronista, citing a report from Coremetrics, an IBM company, claims that Apple mobile products accounted for approximately 10.2 percent of all online sales on Black Friday this year, while rival Android products only accounted for 4.1 percent.

At first look I took this to mean that Apple had a huge surge in sales of its products, which did have a number of sales last week, but what the piece means is that customers using those platforms made 10.2 percent of all purchases.

With Android phones extending their market share lead over Apple’s on a daily basis I found this to be a bit odd. Also the linked to report, while listed for 2011 was actually from 2010. Maybe I just could not get the latest report?

Are Android phones the breeding ground for viruses?
An interesting take on the reason that suddenly we seem to be inundated with alerts that your phone OS, especially Android, is rife with viruses and that you need the latest and greatest anti-virus software to ensure that your every Tweet, text and e-mail is safe.

According to ITWire it is all a conspiracy plot between Intel, its wholly owned subsidiary McAfee and Microsoft. Ok that may be an exaggeration but the piece does throw it out there. Of course as we noted in an earlier brief Google says all of the news of the rise of a new generation of malware is all garbage.

Apple rumor of the week.
Apple is working on a television that understands when you yell at it. Great, mine will explode every football and baseball season, who needs to buy two sets a year. It will also understand gestures. Still don’t see this as a positive. Now if it could cut out the ads I would be a happy camper.

Have a product that will be on display at the upcoming CES show and think we should know about it? Drop us a line and let us know.