Top News this week: Amazon Fire phone, Google's Nest buys Dropcam and more!

From Micromax launching two new Windows Phone devices to Amazon finally taking the wraps off the Fire phone, here’s a quick recap of all the top news in the tech space this week.

  Amazon unveils Fire phone: Starting $199 for 32GB on contract with AT&T

Finally, Amazon unveiled Fire, its first ever smartphone that will be sold exclusively via AT&T with a two-year contract. Pre-orders have begun and customers can either pay $199 for the 32GB version or $299 for the 64GB version. The phone ships on July 25. Amazon is also throwing in 12 months of Amazon Prime service free with Fire.

Taiwan’s Quanta Computer will start mass production of Apple’s first smartwatch in July, a source familiar with the matter said, as the US tech giant tries to prove it can still innovate against rival Samsung. The still-unnamed watch, which Apple followers have dubbed the iWatch, will be the company’s first foray into a niche product category that many remain skeptical about, especially as to whether it can drive profits as growth slows in tech gadgets.

Apple on Wednesday introduced a new 21.5-inch iMac starting at a much ‘lower’ price tag of Rs 79,900. Apple has also reduced the specs for this ‘affordable’ version of its desktop.

Google ‘s Nest Labs will buy home-monitoring camera startup Dropcam for about $555 million in cash, technology blog Re/code reported on Friday, taking another step deeper into consumers’ homes. Nest and Dropcam confirmed the acquisition in separate blog posts on Friday, but did not specify the price tag. Google declined to comment.

Microsoft and four other large American technology companies are using a Manhattan court case to draw a line in the cloud, saying the US government has no right to seize computer data stored outside the country.

Apple’s smartwatch rumours have begun to gather pace. After recent reports about multiple designs, a source now tells 9To5Mac that the company has begun testing the device in intense environments. Apple has teamed up with some notable athletes to test the alleged iWatch’s fitness capabilities, adds the report.

There have been reports hinting at Samsung working on a smartwatch based on Google’s Android Gear. Now, some sources tell Cnet that the phone maker could launch its first smartwatch running Android Wear at the Google I/O event next week.

ASUS will most likely release its ZenFone series of phones in India on July 9 according to sources. The ZenFone series was first announced way back in January 2014 at CES. The ZenFone series comprises 4-inch, 5-inch and 6-inch handsets with most of them being priced aggressively under Rs 25,000. Check out our exclusive hands on with the device.

Micromax’s next flagship after the Canvas Knight, is already up on select online retail stores. The Canvas Gold will pack in some of the best hardware possible (as per Chinese phone standards) for a price tag of Rs 24,000.

Nokia has just released their first ever Android launcher called Z launcher. Confused? Well, this is the Nokia Technologies arm of the company which is separate from the handset division. The launcher is currently in alpha stages and is available for beta testing for a limited time only.

BlackBerry posted a narrower-than-expected quarterly loss on Thursday as the troubled smartphone maker’s turnaround efforts started to pay off, raising hope that its chief executive can deliver on a pledge to return the company to steady profits.

Facebook suffered a global outage for ten minutes and of course everyone noticed . Facebook apologised for the outage but did not say what had happened. Their statement is as follows: “Earlier this morning, we experienced an issue that prevented some users from posting to Facebook for a brief period of time. We resolved the issue quickly, and we are now back to 100%. We’re sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused.

Earlier this week we heard of  Google Fit  to compete with Healthkit, and new reports suggest the search giant is working on Auto Link in response to Apple’s  CarPlay . Some sources tell  Autonews  Google’s new system will now project  content and information from your Android to your car dashboard.

The colorful high-end headphones created by rapper Dr Dre have become a ubiquitous soccer accessory. Neymar likes them Brazil-green. England’s Wayne Rooney, white. Luis Suarez, blue. But soccer world governing body FIFA’s licensing agreement with rival electronics maker Sony Corp means players have to take them off when they are in World Cup stadiums for official matches and media events.

Within 24 hours of blocking incoming calls from Loop Telecom users in Mumbai, Vodafone on Tuesday said it is restoring their connection to its network as the two companies have reached a settlement on interconnection charges. “We have reached an agreement for payment settlement with Loop Mobile. Accordingly the connection is being restored,” a Vodafone spokesperson said.

Facebook launched a smartphone app, Slingshot, on Tuesday that will allow consumers to exchange disappearing photos and videos without requiring Facebook accounts, the Internet company’s latest effort to develop mobile services beyond its core social network. The new app, dubbed Slingshot, allows users to sign up for the service with their mobile phone number and connect with friends in their phone’s contact list or, if they want, by finding their Facebook friends.

Angry Birds Star Wars and Angry Birds Go!, Rovio has teamed up with Hasbro to announce Angry Birds Transformers that will be available in multiple forms, including a mobile game, consumer licensed goods and a product line from Hasbro. The game is expected to feature a battle between the Autobirds (inspired by the Transformer’s Autobots) and the Deceptihogs (Decepticons).

Messaging fiends will be happy to know that a fresh batch of emojis are now on their way. The  Unicode Consortium  has announced that version 7.0 of the Unicode Standard will be available soon, most likely next month, and it will be bringing a slew of much-demanded emojis to the table.

Micromax has launched its first range of Windows Phone 8.1 devices in an event in New Delhi, marking the company’s foray into smartphones with Microsoft’s mobile OS. Micromax was one of the partners announced by Microsoft on stage at BUILD this year, when introducing Windows Phone 8.1. We have been awaiting the first range of handsets powered by WP8.1 since then and following’s Xolo’s first Windows device last week, Micromax has launched two new phones.

From  one-day delivery  to buying apparel maker  Myntra , the popular Indian e-retailer has done it all to compete with rival Amazon. In its latest move, the company is believed to be working on its own brand of tablets. According to a report by  The Economic Times , Flipkart is busy adding finishing touches on its own brand of tablets labelled DigiFlip.