After four successful entries in the franchise, it’s time to reveal yet another showcase of spy stuff, gadgets, vehicles, characters, technology and explosions, all wrapped into approximately two hours of great fun.

Mission Impossible Rogue Nation heads to theaters on July 31st. It will feature Tom Cruise playing the lead role, the Ethan Hunt man of danger, spearheading the Impossible Mission Force (IMF) which was disbanded and neglected by vengeful Washington bureaucrats such as the CIA chief.

The plot revolves around Hunt and his team of spies (Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Ving Rhames and newcomer Rebecca Ferguson) taking on the secretive and shadowy organization called the Syndicate, lead by the yet even more shadowy type of a main character – played by Sean Harris (we don’t know his character’s name for now). The trailer is actually a teaser for a trailer that will be released later today.

The release date for Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation has been pushed forward by a few months. The movie was supposed to be released on December 25th but that would battle the new installment of Star Wars saga, creating a rather difficult situation for both movies it seems. The July 31st timeline is fine by us though! It gives this summer yet another blockbuster to look forward to. Check out the trailer below.

UPDATE – Full trailer has been released, check it out down below. Enjoy it!

The post Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation Trailer Is All Kinds Of Awesome appeared first on VR World.

After becoming the third largest smartphone vendor in the world in 2014, Xiaomi is looking to continue the momentum by setting itself a sales target of 100 million units. To do so, Xiaomi will focus more on its home market as well as India — which the vendor mentioned as its largest overseas market — before setting its sights on the West.

With devices like the Mi 3, Redmi Note and Mi 4, Xiaomi managed sales of 61.1 million in 2014. One of the main reasons for Xiaomi’s success was the remarkably low pricing of its handsets, which were sold at near manufacturing cost. Xiaomi’s global VP Hugo Barra mentioned that the Chinese brand was able to do so as it does not have any significant overhead in terms of marketing and advertising. All Xiaomi products are sold online in a flash sale model, and advertising for the brand is done solely through social media. The model seems to be working very well for the vendor, as it has over 10,50,000 fans on China’s Weibo microblogging service.

Xiaomi hits 100 million sales

Xiaomi will be looking to improve upon its sales numbers with the likes of the Mi Note and Mi Note Pro. Unveiled last month in China, both handsets are a departure from Xiaomi’s previous handsets in that they both feature glass backs. The 2.5D curved glass at the front and 3D glass surface at the back are both protected by Corning’s Gorilla Glass 3, with the bezel at the front a mere 3.0mm. While the resolution of the 5.7-inch Mi Note is at full-HD, Xiaomi has mentioned that the panel used for the device offers adaptive dynamic contrast as well as a night mode that reduces glare in low-light conditions.

In terms of hardware, the Mi Note offers a quad-core 2.5 GHz Snapdragon 801 SoC that features an Adreno 330 GPU, 3GB RAM, 16/64GB internal storage, dual-SIM connectivity, 24-bit/192KHz lossless audio playback, 13MP camera (IMX214) with OIS, 4MP front camera and a 3,000mAh battery.

The Mi Note Pro — as the name suggests — is the beefier of the two, and features a 5.7-inch 2K (2560 x 1440) display, 64-bit octa-core Snapdragon 810 SoC, an astounding 4GB LPDDR4 RAM, 64GB internal memory based on the eMMC 5.0 standard, 13MP rear camera, 4MP front camera and LTE Category 9 connectivity along with a 3,000mAh battery.

The Mi Note is available for sale in China with prices starting at $370, while the Mi Note Pro will go on sale later this month at $530. During the initial months of a device’s launch, Xiaomi does not make a significant amount of money from sales, but as the lifecycle of the handset wears on and the cost of the components used comes down, the vendor manages to eke out a small margin. This is why all of Xiaomi’s handsets are manufactured have a limited production run as that decreases overall cost incurred.

Going after Apple in China

After targeting the likes of Samsung (KRX: 005930) and Lenovo (HKG: 0992) in its home markets, Xiaomi has raised the bar and is now setting its sights squarely on Apple, and the iPhone 6 Plus. Apple’s (NASDAQ: APPL) larger iPhone debuted in China to great success, with demand for the device far greater than supply.

Xiaomi called out Apple on several occasions during the launch of its latest handsets, making a reference to how the camera sensor on the Mi Note sits flush on the body, unlike the iPhone 6 Plus and iPhone 6. Xiaomi also revealed how it was able to fit a screen that’s 0.2mm larger than what is on offer with the iPhone 6 Plus in a body that is thinner by 0.15mm.

The first few flash sales of the Mi Note have concluded, with the device selling out in mere minutes, which is essentially what is to be expected of a Xiaomi flash sale these days. A device’s success does not depend only on the hardware, however, and in terms of software, Xiaomi is looking to step up its efforts.

Both the Mi Note and Mi Note Pro come with the latest version of Xiaomi’s operating system, MIUI 6. With over 100 million global users, MIUI began life as a custom Android ROM, and is installed as standard on all Xiaomi devices. The latest iteration bears a slight resemblance to iOS 7, but there is a wide chasm when comparing the experience offered by the two operating systems. MIUI 6 offers a combination of settings and functionality that is geared at novice users as well as power users. The plethora of settings that allow users to customize all facets of the operating system are cleverly hidden away so as not to overwhelm new users to the ecosystem.  Xiaomi offers its own suite of software services, and with the Play Store banned in China, these are the main gateway for Chinese consumers to access mobile services.

Building a lifestyle brand

Xiaomi is known for its handsets, but the brand wants to be much more than that. By offering TVs, routers, smart home products and even air purifiers, Xiaomi is looking to become a lifestyle brand, with Barra stating as much during his MWC keynote. Xiaomi is looking to build an ecosystem of services and products that integrate with the vendor’s software offering, MIUI. Doing so will prove to be a challenge, but given Xiaomi’s loyal fanbase, most of whom are in their mid-twenties, as well as the brand recognition it commands in China, venturing into the IoT market as well as exploring new territories.

At a media event held in San Francisco on February 12, Xiaomi has announced that it will be launching its Mi.com store in the US later this year, through which the vendor will offer accessories such as the $15 Mi Band fitness tracker, Mi piston headphones and the Mi power banks. At Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Xiaomi announced that it would be launching the accessory store in Europe as well. The goal behind making accessories available to customers in Westerns countries is to get feedback from a wider audience base and generate interest in Xiaomi as a brand.

With stellar handsets and a move into wearables, action cameras and smart home products, Xiaomi is trying for the first time this year to achieve vertical integration: tie in different products with a single software experience.

The post Xiaomi’s Goals For 2015: 100 Million Handset Sales, Expansion to the West appeared first on VR World.

After entering India in July, Chinese manufacturer Xiaomi has grown from strength to strength, much the same way as it has done in its home market. Xiaomi has quickly managed to gain a foothold in the Indian segment thanks to great value for money devices like the Mi 3 and the Redmi 1S, and now the handset vendor is looking to consolidate its position by broadening its presence in the country.

The first announcement to that effect came yesterday from Hugo Barra, who revealed that ex-Googler Jai Mani will be joining Xiaomi India as lead product manager.

Xiaomi intends to create an ecosystem of content tailored to Indian users, and plans on achieving that are already underway thanks to the contributions of several forum members, who have successfully managed to translate the handset vendor’s MIUI to local languages. Barra noted that by hiring Mani, Xiaomi is laying the cornerstone for further expansion in the country: “You can think of it as the beginning of our R&D center development in India.”

Mani will be working closely with Xiaomi India head Manu Kumar Jain and will be the “glue between our users in India, product feedback that we receive, and the engineering team we have in Beijing as well as the engineering team that we are going to be building fairly soon in India.

While his exact job duties haven’t been mentioned, it is clear that Mani has been brought in to add further localization to Xiaomi’s products in the country. Not one to lose momentum, Xiaomi has announced that its third handset for the country, the Redmi Note, will be launching later this month, while the flagship Mi 4 is slated to make its debut before the end of the year.

Xiaomi has successfully managed to dethrone Samsung (KRX:005935) to take the position of the number one handset vendor in China, and it is hoping to achieve a similar feat in India. 

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