Apple Inc Fined by Taiwan

Apple Inc. has been fined Taiwan$20 million (US$670,000) and was ordered to halt their practice of interfering with the pricing of mobile service providers and handset distributors. Taiwan's Fair Trade Commission (FTC)  released the statement on Wednesday.

FTC said that Apple Asia demanded carriers and handset distributors to ask their permission before setting contract prices on iPhones which is a violation of Taiwan's free-trade laws. They also ask carriers to change service contract prices and subsidy price.

Local Taiwan carriers: Chunghwa Telecom Co Ltd, Taiwan Mobile Co Ltd and Far EasTone Telecommunications Co Ltd, had all obtained reseller rights under their contracts with Apple, which gave them the right to set prices, FTC spokesman Sun Lih-chyun said.

New Tablets This Week

Leaked iPad 5 photo

Leaked iPads pictures

Major tech companies are set to launch new tablets this week. Apple have sent official press invites last week to their launch event that will take place in London on Tuesday October 22. Aple is expected to launch its next generation iPads at the event which includes iPad 5 and the new ipad Mini.

Nokia is also set to unveil their new Lumia 1520 at an event in Abu Dhabi also on Tuesday October 22. Rumors said that the Nokia handset will be running on Windows and has a 6 inches 1080p screen with a 20MP PureView camera.

Microsoft which announced its Surface 2 tablets last month will officially go on sale also tomorrow October 22. The Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2 are tablets that runs on Windows 8.1 operating system. Surface Pro 2 will have the same ClearType HD display as before but will be 20% faster and a 75% increase in battery life. While the Surface 2 runs on Windows 8.1 RT version. It is powered by an Nvidia Tegra 4 processor and comes with up to 10-hour battery life for video playback.