In each issue of Distro, Executive Editor Marc Perton publishes a wrap-up of the week in news.
In the US, Labor Day traditionally marks the end of the lazy days of summer, and the beginning of the busy fall season. While this summer was hardly quiet -- it included, you might recall, major product launches from the likes of Motorola, Google, LG, HTC and others -- the fall started with a bang, with Microsoft's surprise announcement on Labor Day that it was buying Nokia's devices and services division for $7 billion. The deal gets Microsoft a guaranteed hardware partner for Windows Phone, and quite possibly a new CEO, as the company has all but admitted that Nokia's Stephen Elop is first in line to replace outgoing CEO Steve Ballmer. It might also be considered a bargain. Just two years ago, Google paid over $12 billion for Motorola; that same year, Microsoft made another expensive telecom acquisition: it bought Skype for $8.5 billion.
Before we even had time to digest Microsoft's news, Apple announced -- somewhat anticlimactically -- that it would indeed have a major event next week, where the company is expected to launch an upgraded iPhone 5, as well as a lower-end model, along with lots of new colors. Meanwhile, Amazon announced an upgraded version of the Kindle Paperwhite e-book reader, and Google's Android KitKat became the first operating system with a name licensed from a candy company. And this was all before the week's real news started rolling in from IFA.
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