On CE - For Dealers, Distributors and OEMs of Consumer Electronics throughout EMEA

Ikea will soon start selling furniture with built-in home entertainment systems with UPPLEVA ("experience" in Swedish)-- a range offering an "integrated solution for the living room."

The Uppleva range has x3 designs, all carrying an LED TV, 2.1 sound system (with wireless subwoofers), wifi connectivity and CD/DVD/Blu-ray players, all from China-based CE maker TCL Multimedia.

The TVs come in 4 sizes with x4 HDMI inputs, x2 USB ports and DivX media media.

Ikea will launch the range in Sweden, France, Italy, Poland, Spain, Denmark, Norway and Portugal on Q3 2012, with other countries to follow sometime around Q2 2013.

Go Ikea Living Room Furniture with Integrated TV and Audio

Nokia reports troubled results for Q1 2012, with "mixed" sales for its first Windows Phone-powered devices adding to dwindling profits and cash reserves.

First, the numbers. Total Q1 2012 Nokia sales are down by -29% Y-o-Y (reaching €7.4 billion) while total net cash (cash less debt) are down by -24% Y-o-Y, amounting to €4.9bn. Total 2011 spendings for Nokia total €1.5bn, while Q1 2012 spending is already up to €700 million.

Back in 2011, Nokia CEO Stephen Elop compared Nokia's situation as being on "a burning oil platform"-- with jumping into the ocean as the only option for survival. He was, of course, referring to Nokia's jumping on the Windows Phone platform.

Did Nokia miss the lifeboat and land in dangerous waters instead?

It appears more "smart" watches are entering in the market-- Sony unveils the SmartWatch, an Android-powered device bringing (some) smartphone functions to customers' wrists.

It has a 1.3" OLED touchscreen and connects to Android (2.1 and above) smartphones via Bluetooth to shows text messages, emails, Facebook/Twitter updates, weather forecasts and even call previews.

Sony also claims the SmartWatch allows one to answer connected phones. We hope it involved talking directly to the SmartWatch, just like Dick Tracy does with his 2-way wrist radio.

The SmartWatch is but one of a number of recent wrist-mountable smart gadgets, such as Motorola's Motoactiv, the Wimm One and the latest iPod Nano. It is available now, together with additional wristbands in x5 different colours.

Go Sony SmartWatch

Keeping track of the ever-ongoing patent wars is hard work-- but now keeping tabs on who is suing who is easier thanks to a Bloomberg infographic showing key cases at the International Trade Commission.

As the graphic shows, the smartphone patent wars appear to radiate from one source-- Apple. Other vendors in the various legal fights include Samsung, Motorola Mobility, HTC, VIA, S3 Graphics and even Kodak.