A solar-powered airplane finished crossing the United States on Saturday, landing in New York City after flying over the Statue of Liberty during its historic bid to circle the globe, the project team said. The spindly, single-seat experimental aircraft, dubbed Solar Impulse 2, arrived at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport at about 4 a.m. local time after it took off about five hours beforehand at Lehigh Valley International Airport in Pennsylvania, the team reported on the airplane's website. Such a pleasure to land in New York! For the 14th time we celebrate sustainability," said the project's co-founder Andre Borschberg on Twitter after flying over the city and the Statue of Liberty during the 14th leg of the trip around the globe. The Swiss team flying the aircraft in a campaign to build support for clean energy technologies hopes eventually to complete its circumnavigation in Abu Dhabi, where the journey began in March 2015. The solar cr...
Smartphone sales in China have fallen year-on-year for the first time, according to data gathered by Gartner. The market research firm says 4% fewer handsets were sold in the months of April, May and June compared with the same period in 2014. It suggests the market has "reached saturation" - meaning about half the population owns a smartphone and is not upgrading on an annual basis. However, not all manufacturers experienced a drop. Samsung's sales were 49% lower - despite the launch of its Galaxy S6 models- and Lenovo also experienced a big fall-off in demand. But Apple's sales rose 68%, even though it did not have new phones out. Huawei took the top spot in its home country with a 46% growth in sales.
Gartner research director Anshul Gupta said: "Samsung is down significantly, not just in China, but in other markets as well. "And the Chinese players have taken a significant lead in their home market." Samsung's figures will have been affected by problems it had making the S6 Edge's curved screen, which meant the firm could not meet demand.
| Manufacturer | China rank Q2 2015 | China rank Q2 2014 | Growth/fall in sales |
| Huawei | 1 | 5 | +45.9% |
| Xiaomi | 2 | 2 | +13.4% |
| Apple | 3 | 6 | +67.6% |
| BBK Electronics | 4 | 7 | +48.9% |
| Oppo | 5 | 9 | +72.5% |
| Samsung | 6 | 1 | -48.9% |
| Lenovo | 7 | 3 | -42.7% |
| Source: Gartner |
But Mr Gupta stressed that the bigger picture was that overall sales
"Most people in major cities like Beijing already own a smartphone, and the penetration of smartphones across the general population is approaching 50% or more, which is a relatively high rate." China's smartphone sales tend to be strongest in the first quarter, when people give presents to mark the Chinese New Year.
In addition, many of the highest-profile launches tend to happen in the last five months of the year, so many industry watchers may wish to see further data before accepting that the country's smartphone market is truly in retreat.
"The Chinese economy is also not as strong as it was, and the level of innovation from smartphone-makers is also taking a pause at the moment," added Mr Mawston.
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