Though the FTC hasn’t released comments it received by the April 30 deadline for the “Nixing the Fix” inquiry into manufacturer restrictions on third-party repairs, one advocate for third-party repairs did. IFixit believes device owners “should have the right to repair, modify, and tinker with the things they own.” iFixit blogged that it was posting its comments online for download “in the interest of full transparency” for people who thought right-to-repair was just “a fringe issue that only affects the tech-savvy DIYers among us.” The agency wants to know whether the limitations can thwart consumer protections under the 1975 Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, (see 1904220039). The FTC will post the high volume of submissions it received “at some point” on the agency’s Nixing the Fix “event page,” emailed a spokesperson Thursday. “It may take a while since we have to review it all.” The FTC has said it will use the comments to shape the agenda for the Nixing the Fix workshop it will host July 16. Tech groups, including CTA, for years have lobbied heavily against state right-to-repair laws on various grounds, including that they wrongly impose government regulation on the relationship between OEMs and equipment repair facilities. CTA didn’t comment Thursday.

Sony Mobile will launch the Xperia 1 July 12 on Verizon at Best Buy, Amazon, B&H Photo, Focus Camera and other retailers, it said Thursday. The $949 smartphone will be the first to include a 4K OLED display, said Sony.

Summit Wireless Technologies embedded licensable software has been demoed for about 15 companies under nondisclosure agreements, said CEO Brett Moyer on a Q1 call Wednesday. The audio tech's IP version is designed to hit the "sweet spot" of good enough to “penetrate the broad market” -- the 1.3 billion smartphones, 200 million smart TVs and 200 million tablets sold each year, he said. Summit will secure an “alpha customer this year and launch with them,” he said.

Qualcomm announced support Thursday for Google Assistant and Google Fast Pair on the Qualcomm Smart Headset platform. Smart Headset, based on Qualcomm’s QCC5100 series low-power Bluetooth audio chips, includes hardware and software required for manufacturers to create differentiated wireless stereo earbuds and headsets with support for Google Assistant for various product tiers and categories, said the company. The reference design supports push-button activation for Google Assistant, which connects to the Google Assistant app running on a smartphone. The platform comprises processing capability, connectivity options, voice assistant interfaces and premium audio technologies.

About a dozen groups formally backed General Motors' ask that the FCC pull the company's waiver bid to not provide some real-time texting functions in Cruise shared autonomous vehicles (see 1904260002). The RTT mandates that the automaker sought to escape "appear, at least at this preliminary stage of development of GM service, to be inapplicable to the service," said the American Association of People with Disabilities, National Association of the Deaf, Telecommunications for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing and others. The filing posted Wednesday in docket 15-178.

Headset supplier Poly, which includes Plantronics, wants to exit the consumer business to stay “laser-focused” on its enterprise opportunity, said CEO Joseph Burton on a call Tuesday about the quarter ended March 31. It’s in the “very early days of thinking this through,” he said. Whether it sells the business in “a single transaction to a single buyer” or through “multiple transactions” or finds a joint venture partner, “all that's a little bit still in front of us,” he said. Consumer is roughly 8 percent of total revenue, he said. Poly is watching this week’s tariffs situation “like a hawk,” and is “uniquely positioned ... versus some of our competitors” to weather the storm if the third tranche of Chinese duties rise to 25 percent (see 1905080033), said Burton. It builds a “considerable number” of its products “in-house” in a factory it owns in Tijuana, Mexico, he said.

The virtual-reality market “could grow rapidly with 5G,” said Kopin CEO John Fan on a Q1 call Tuesday, and the microdisplay supplier is “optimistic” consumer demand for VR and augmented-reality headsets ultimately will match that of the “pretty hot” enterprise AR/VR market “in the coming years.” Fan, when pressed, disclosed that Kopin is developing a new Solos AR headset targeted toward a broader consumer audience than the limited cyclist demographic from before. OLED microdisplays “will be the display of choice for VR because of its superior performance,” especially if it can “achieve high brightness,” he said. Increasing peak brightness to 5,000 nits from the current 1,000 nits “will enable innovative optical designs,” including headsets with “much thinner” forms, said Fan.

Rhapsody’s Powered by Napster format is available to partners in high-resolution and Studio Quality options, after an agreement with Master Quality Authenticated for its MQA format, said the companies Monday. Napster will offer MQA tracks on mobile, automotive and home platforms, they said. Under the partnership, original, high-res versions of music can be delivered and authenticated during streaming.

ProSource needs to address change -- “you can’t stop change” -- CEO Dave Workman told members at the spring conference Wednesday in San Antonio, speaking of opportunities presented by changes in the consumer technology industry. Reaching millennials and Generation Z consumers has been a recent theme for the group, whose roots are in the baby boomer generation. Over the next 20-30 years, that generation will pass down what some estimates say will be more than $30 trillion to Generation X and millennials, “the consumers of tomorrow,” he said. Dealers have to market to millennials differently because they research and shop differently, Workman said. Millennials value the “experience” of shopping, part of the reason ProSource, along with sister buying group BrandSource, is emphasizing showroom upgrades. Key initiatives include a differentiated experience and ensuring the digital marketing message and in-store experience are equal. A 5G revolution also is coming, Workman said, with content driving “a tremendous amount of change.” As content “comes to the home differently tomorrow, there’s updates and changes that are going to have to come with the home,” he said. Murray Huppin, president of Huppin’s and OneCall, envisioned being able to "showroom" to customers on a smartphone how a product or system will fit into their home. Responding to our question on consumer concerns about data privacy in connected homes, Workman said it’s a topic that “probably needs a lot of attention. Everything gets hacked at some point, it seems.” A stopgap measure for dealers is a digital insurance policy to protect against a lawsuit over a network data breach, he said, but next steps are uncertain. Most integrators aren’t paying enough attention to cyberthreats and don’t have the internal systems needed to protect networked homes, said Listen Up President Walt Stinson. As a larger company, Listen Up has the resources to address that part of the business, but “most integrators struggle" with it,” he said. Huppin noted a security-focused presentation at a conference last year, which provided resources for dealers, but no ongoing program has been set up since, something both dealers said should be done.

Global smartphone shipments declined 6.6 percent to 310.8 million units, “a clear sign that 2019 will be another down year,” said IDC Tuesday. Shipments declined 4.1 percent, “inclusive of a first quarter” that was down 3.5 percent, roughly “just half of what the market experienced in Q1 this year, it said. "The overall smartphone market continues to be challenged in almost all areas, yet Huawei was able to grow shipments by 50%.” That made the brand “a clear number two in terms of market share,” and it’s “closing the gap” on leader Samsung, it said: “This new ranking of Samsung, Huawei, and Apple is very likely what we'll see" in 2019.