Gisele Bündchen is already the world's richest model, but her wealth is about to hit new heights. As her lingerie line goes global, Gisele is set to become the world's first billionaire model.

The Gisele Bündchen Brazilian Intimates range was launched last May and has already proved popular in Latin America, Portugal, Japan and Israel. Now, further expansion is expected.

With her various product endorsements and business ventures, Gisel earned a total of $45 million USD last year. She's now on track to become the first billionaire supermodel.

Model Bar Refaeli, 26, is said to be following in Gisele's footsteps and is also preparing to launch her own collection of underwear next month.

After a technology blog reported that BlackBerry maker Research in Motion was actively seeking to sell itself to smartphone rival Samsung Electronics, shares of RIM jumped more than 8 percent.

BoyGeniusReport.com cited an unidentified source indicating that RIM co-CEO Jim Balsillie was meeting with companies interested in either licensing its software or buying a part or all of RIM. Samsung is reportedly leading the pack.

In recent months, RIM has been a target of takeover speculation as its market valuation has hit multi-year lows amid profit warnings and product delays.

Samsung, which is said to be interested in buying RIM, has emerged as the No. 1 smartphone manufacturer on the demand for its Android-based devices. While RIM stock has jumped more than 6 percent four times since December 21, 2012, it is still down almost 75 percent from a year ago.

Rumors have been swirling for weeks about the next generation iPad, the iPad 3, and when it might become available to consumers. It appears as though the launch may be sooner rather than later, as we've learned that production on the iPad 3 began earlier this month.

Bloomberg initially broke the news that production on the iPad 3 had already gotten underway. The news outlet also claims that the iPad 3 will support 4G LTE, and will feature a new HD display and a faster quad-core processor. These features are in line with several other earlier reports. Other rumored features of the device include a slightly thicker case, and twice the battery of the current iPad 2.

It has been rumored that the iPad 3 will launch in March. Factores are said to be running 24 hours a day in an effort to build as much stock as possible ahead of the launch.

Samsung has tinkered around with some partially white versions of their tablet computers, with the back of the devices being white and the front bezel around the screen remaining black. Now it appears that they're working on some all-white Galaxy Tabs, as a white Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus have been seen in Vietnam with an all-white design.

Reports claim that the specs on the all-white Galaxy Tabs remain unchanged. The only difference is the bezel around the screen. No details on pricing or availability has been announced yet.

According to tech industry watchdog Digitimes, Pegatron Technology has reportedly received a small volume of orders for the upcoming iPad 3, which is set to launch in March.

Apple has supposedly revised and revamped their outsourcing strategy, and will thus have Pegatron focus on production of the iPad series, and Foxconn will serve as an auxilliary in 2013. Foxconn's primary focus will be the iPhone. Pegatron will produce only a small number of smartphones. This new strategy is designed to decrease risk and increase the quality of products.

Apple has already visited Pegatron's plants in China several times. Digitimes claims that Pegatron will see a "significant increase" in orders for an iPad 4 launch, which is supposedly set for October with an initial volume of 7 to 10 million units.

On Sunday, the organization that sets standards for USB announced that USB 3.0 ports will be coming to smartphones and tablets by the end of the year. Rahman Ismail, CTO of the USB Implementers Forum, said that mobile devices will feature microUSB ports based on USB 3.0 technology to fit the small size of the devices.

Presently, smartphones and tablets use the older, slower USB 2.0 technology. Upgraded devices, however, will now sport data transfer rates as fast as 800Mbps. Ismail described it:

“What takes 15 minutes will roughly take 1 minute and 10 seconds.”

USB 3.0 mobile transfer will be a bit slower than PC, however. Mobile data transfer for USB 3.0 devices can reach up to 5Gbps, but both mobile phones and tablets will now feature faster charging due to the faster power flow through USB 3.0 ports.

Nokia famously abandoned its own mobile phone operating system and hooked up with Microsoft to run their Windows Phone 7.5 software on their phones. These phones have launched in Europe and are preparing to launch now in the United States, where more than a $200 million advertising budget will be spent in promoting the phones. Today, rumors that Microsoft could take over Nokia's smartphone division have resurfaced, the same rumors that were shot down last year.

Mobile industry watcher Eldar Murtazin took to Twitter today to proclaim that Microsoft and Nokia executives will soon be meeting with each other to discuss the possibility of Microsoft taking over the smartphone division, and the terms of a deal.

Murtazin says such a deal between the two tech giants could be finalized in the second half of 2012. The deal, if it came to fruition, would leave Nokia with just its "dumb" phone or feature phone business, Nokia Siemens NEtworks, and mapping services subsidiary Navteq.

Murtazin also says that current Nokia boss Stephen Elon will resign from his role as CEO sometime in 2012, and could possibly return to Microsoft where he once ran the Business Division. He also claims that the Windows smartphones would no longer be branded "Nokia."

AT&T has formally and officially made the move not to pursue plans to acquire T-Mobile USA on Monday, bowing to U.S. antitrust authorities by withdrawing its $39 billion acquisition plans.

The deal had been seen by many as a long-shot from the start. Nine months later, both AT&T and T-Mobile USA are looking for a way to move forward, without takeover plans. AT&T had already pulled its application from the Federal Communications Commission, as well as put on hold its efforts to fight the Justice Department's lawsuit to block the deal. AT&T ultimately concluded that it could not put together a package of divestitures or other tactics that would appease U.S. officials that had deemed the deal against the public interest and anti-competitive.

The FCC was extremely skeptical of the merger, and the Justice Dept. said that combining the No. 2 and No. 4 wireless carriers in the U.S. would hurt competition by leaving the market too concentrated, and would also likely raise prices for consumers. In order to close the deal, AT&T needed the approval of both the FCC and Justice Dept.

Had the merger gone through, all 75 percent of all contract wireless customers would be in the hands of either AT&T or Verizon Wireless.

Honda Motor Co. has issued a recall for 304,000 vehicles around the world due to airbags that may inflate with too much pressure in a crash, sending metal and plastic pieces flying, causing injuries and death.

According to Honda, there have been 20 accidents thus far related to the problem, including two deaths in the United States in 2009. Honda announced the recall, which affects the Accord, Civic, Odyssey, Pilot, CR-V and other models, early on Friday.

The recall covers 273,000 vehicles in the U.S., about 27,000 in Canada, 2,000 in Japan, and another 2,000 in other countries. Just 359 vehicles in Europe were affected.

This latest recall is an expansion of recalls for the same issue in 2008, which was again carried out in 2009 and 2010. The recall now covers 2 million vehicles worldwide, according to the Japanese automaker.

Nokia's new Windows-based phones are priced to move and have impressed several analysts. On Thursday, a team from Barclays Capital said that Nokia's first batch of Windows phones weren't as differentiated as they had hoped, but are priced competitively.

In a note to investors, the Barclays team wrote:

“We believe [Nokia's] devices will be competitive in the marketplace from both hardware and pricing standpoint. Nokia in fact highlighted that pricing tariffs for the Lumia 800 and Lumia 710 will be one notch cheaper than the iPhone 4S across all launch markets.”

Analysts were also impressed by the number of carriers that will be supporting the devices across launch markets, stating:

“We have been positively surprised by the large number of operators involved (an average of 5 per country where the device will be launched in Western Europe this quarter)."