The FTC’s “Nixing the Fix” half-day workshop July 16 about manufacturer restrictions on third-party repairs of consumer products will feature three panels heavily stacked with right-to-repair advocates, but no individual tech companies, according to a final agenda released at the agency Tuesday. Walter Alcorn, CTA vice president-environmental affairs and industry sustainability, will appear on a panel on the impact of self-repair restrictions on consumers and small businesses. CTA, along with other tech groups, has lobbied for years against state right-to-repair laws, saying they wrongly impose government regulation on the relationship between OEMs and equipment repair facilities (see 1704090001). Alcorn will share the panel with Vibrant Technologies CEO Jennifer Larson, whose firm refurbishes and resells used information technology equipment. Larson is a supporter of right-to-repair legislation in her native Minnesota because she argues the large tech firms are trying to put organizations like hers out of business through measures that include limiting free-market access to replacement parts. Another panelist, Theresa McDonough, who owns Tech Medic, an independent repair shop in Middlebury, Vermont, argued on a Vermont Public Radio podcast last year that all the big tech companies are “guilty” of building planned obsolescence and limited repairability into their products, making it difficult for operations like hers to survive. "The older-generation iPads, if you needed a new charging port, they had a pop connector, you could easily change them out,” she said. “But with some of the newer generations, they solder them in. I get that there are some technological advances that require soldering, but things like charging ports don’t need the micro-soldering.” Apple didn’t comment Wednesday. Other workshop panels will feature state legislators who have sponsored or backed right-to-repair bills, plus the Repair Association advocacy group and iFixit, one of its key board members. The FTC has said the workshop will examine whether manufacturer repair restrictions can undercut consumer protections in the 1975 Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, which it’s charged with enforcing. The commission will accept written comments through Sept. 16 in the Nixing the Fix docket but has been silent on what actions it might take on the public input it receives.

The one-time feud between Amazon and Google (see 1712280031) seems like distant history as the two tech giants have loosened restrictions preventing co-mingling of their hardware, software and platforms. Amazon.com is selling Google Chromecast devices -- which compete directly with its Fire TV sticks -- and as of Tuesday, Amazon Prime Video content can be viewed on Google’s Chromecast and Android TV devices, and the YouTube app is available on Fire TV, Google blogged. Amazon’s Prime members will have unlimited access to Amazon Originals and films on Google devices, while Google’s YouTube app will be available on “select” Amazon Fire TV devices: second-gen and 4K Fire TV Sticks, Fire TV Cube, Fire TV basic and Toshiba, Insignia, Element and Westinghouse Fire TV Edition smart TVs. Chromecast and Chromecast built-in users, with access to over 2,000 apps for content and games, can now cast content directly from their phone’s Prime Video app to a TV, said Google. Chromecast Ultra users will get access to 4,000 titles included with Prime at no additional cost, it said. Users will need the latest Prime Video app and Android 5.0 or higher or iOS 10.1 or higher on their phone or tablet to receive the update. In addition to the select Android TV devices that currently have Prime Video, “many more” Android TVs, set-top boxes and streaming devices will soon have the streaming service, it said.

Home energy monitoring company Sense warned consumers how vampire power can lead to expensive utility bills. Consumer electronics and other “always on” devices make up 23 percent of power consumption in the average U.S. household, costing residents an average $335 per year, it said, and about 10 percent pay more than $1,000 annually "to keep their gadgets on all the time.” Entertainment centers and audio systems are some of the biggest energy hogs, using $25-$60 a year in "vampire power," even when off, it said. “An Alexa here, a camera there, a couple laptops charging adds up,” said Sense, saying homes with 15 or more devices can spend $585 annually on vampire power.

With 90 percent of U.S. laptops and more than 75 percent of smartphones sourced from China, “there is simply insufficient capacity in the rest of the world to absorb production shifts of these high-demand devices in the short term,” commented the Software & Information Industry Association, posted Tuesday in docket USTR-2019-0004. If the List 4 Section 301 tariffs on those products are implemented, “U.S. producers would have to either sacrifice profits on U.S. sales or pass increased costs on to consumers by raising prices,” said SIIA. “In the low-margin and high-risk consumer hardware business, few if any U.S. firms would be able to absorb a 25% surcharge on products without losing significant market share to foreign competitors who are not burdened by such additional costs.” SIIA fears “many smaller U.S. firms in these sectors would simply go out of business, while larger firms would become less competitive globally." And "raising prices at this time of year further risks missing production goals for the critical holiday season.” That can “damage annual sales targets” and risk compromising the “the long-term viability of a product,” the group said. Post-hearing rebuttals were due Tuesday, ending the List 4 rulemaking proceeding. President Donald Trump put the List 4 tariffs on hold after agreeing to resume trade negotiations with China (see 1907010070 or 1907010015).

Sprint’s third 5G device, the Samsung Galaxy S10 5G, went on sale in Atlanta, Dallas, Houston and Kansas City and will be available in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Phoenix and Washington, D.C., in the coming weeks, said the carrier. Separately Friday, a court heard preliminary information about states seeking to block the carrier being bought by T-Mobile (see 1906210033).

Enterprises and healthcare want to free smartwatches from cellular, while carriers push subsidies or financing options for watches with cellular service, reported IDC Wednesday. Half are expected to be connected to a cellular network in the next four years. Wearable devices, on track for global shipments of 222.9 million units this year, are expected to reach 302.3 million in 2023. Smartwatches and ear-worn devices will be more than 70 percent of all wearables. The category is diversifying by connectivity and distribution, said analyst Jitesh Ubrani. Apple is expected to continue to lead in watches, with 25.9 percent share in 2023 vs 41.2 percent today, while the category overall grows from 91.8 million units in 2019 to 131.6 million. Mature markets such as North America and Western Europe are expected to have declining shipments in wristbands as users transition to smartwatches.

ON Semiconductor completed its Quantenna Communications cash buy with an equity value of $1.07 billion, it said Wednesday. Quantenna’s Wi-Fi technologies and ON's power and analog semiconductors creates "a formidable platform" for connectivity in industrial, automotive and carrier markets, said ON Semiconductor CEO Keith Jackson. ON announced the plan to buy Quantenna in March (see 1903280049) and antitrust authorities cleared the acquisition in April (see 1904230053). Quantenna will be integrated into ON's analog solutions group, headed by general manager Vince Hopkin.

Corning wants to double sales of its Gorilla Glass cover glass for smartphones to $2 billion by 2023, “even as the smartphone market matures,” said John Bayne, general manager of Corning Gorilla Glass. It's based on increasing the amount of Corning glass content built into the average device, he said Friday at the firm's investor day. In 2016, “we were selling into a handheld device that used a single piece of Gorilla Glass 3,” said Bayne. “We sold that glass in sheet form to a finisher who made it into a part.” Corning “was capturing” 50 cents of revenue on the average device, he said. This year, it sells to smartphone OEMs that use a piece of Gorilla Glass 6 on the front of the device, plus a second on the back, said Bayne. “For the glass on the front, we’re making and decorating that part.” Revenue capture on the average device is $12, he said. The company plans to continue bringing “innovations” in mobile devices to market, including those “that we believe can help to solve some of technology challenges facing the first generation of foldable products,” said Bayne. Samsung's April postponement of its Galaxy Fold launch validated CEO Wendell Weeks' forecast that foldable smartphones wouldn't be ready for prime time soon (see 1904220028).

Google Fiber's trying to justify waiver of some audio accessibility set-top box functions because they're supposedly less used "is insultingly dismissive" of the visually impaired, the National Federation of the Blind said in an FCC docket 12-108 posting last week. It doesn't oppose the amended limited waiver petition (see 1905140066), but will watch to see if further waivers are filed in the near future. NFB said the FCC should deny any that ask for further extending the deadlines. The frequency of a particular feature's use is irrelevant when its presence is to ensure everyone can use the program or service, it said. Google Fiber emailed Thursday that accessibility "remains a priority." "Our video product provides accessibility-compliant solutions for most of the critical features our customers most frequently use, and we continue to focus on developing innovative solutions for these few remaining features to provide the most inclusive experience for all of our customers," it said.

Antennas made of carbon nanotube films are as efficient as copper for wireless applications, while being tougher, more flexible and can be “painted onto devices,” reported researchers Monday at Rice University’s Brown School of Engineering. The conductive films can match the performance of copper films while being made thinner to better handle higher frequencies, which could have application in 5G devices, said researchers. At target frequencies of 5, 10 and 14 GHz, the antennas “easily held their own with their metal counterparts,” when extending to frequencies that “aren't even used in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth networks today, but will be used in the upcoming 5G generation of antennas," said Amram Bengio, lead author of the research in the Rice lab. Bengio founded a company to further develop the material. The new antennas could also be suitable for unmanned aerial vehicles where weight is a consideration, as wireless telemetry portals for downhole oil and gas exploration and for future IoT applications, researchers said.