News; Beats Headphones have been a popular accessory during the Olympi

Beats Headphones have been a popular accessory during the Olympics, with athletes donning over-ear cans prior to events, presumably to get some adrenaline flowing ahead of their performance. I can only speculate as to what kind of music our muscular medal hopes have chosen, but I'd guess it's something from Rocky. Or Carly Rae Jepsen. It still leaves HTC as the largest single external shareholder, owning around 25 per cent of the company, The Next Web reports. The audio tech will remain present in HTC's phones too -- and seeing as it'll stay the exclusive mobile partner, no one else will see the tech on their handsets. So why the deal?

Well HTC and Beats describe it as a "realignment", providing Beats By Dr Dre "with more flexibility for global expansion while maintaining HTC's major stake and commercial exclusivity in mobile." But the two companies will "continue to work closely, including a joint global marketing campaign later this year."

There were already signs that things weren't going swimmingly with the partnership, with HTC rumoured to be dissatisfied. HTC's Martin Fichter told our sister site CNET that "an accessory like the headphone doesn't factor in when someone is buying a smart phone." Under the deal, HTC bundled Beats headphones with its handsets, though that stopped being the case in April of this year. Maybe HTC regrets driving a truck full of money up to Dr. Dre's house. Yesterday it announced its results for the first three months of the year, and things were… well, not all that rosy. Revenue dropped 35 per cent on the same period last year. In the last quarter of 2011, the company's profits fell 25 per cent as well, while Samsung saw a massive 73 per cent jump.