Transport Industry Review

Heathrow's value boosted by Ferrovial's stake sale

2011-10-10T10:38:00.000-07:00

Ferrovial said on Monday that it had agreed to sell 5.88 percent of its BAA investment vehicle, FGP Topco, to U.S. infrastructure investment group Alinda Capital Partners for 325 million euros (278 million pounds), valuing BAA at 5.52 billion euros.

"It's been a good sale at a great price but we don't plan to sell any more (of BAA) at the moment," a spokesman for Ferrovial said.

The sale means Ferrovial's stake in BAA will drop to 49.99 percent from 55.87 percent, the Spanish company said, allowing it to deconsolidate BAA's debt from its balance sheet.

Combining personalised videos with mapping

2009-07-09T03:05:00.000-07:00

In 2008, Virgin 1 secured the rights to broadcast Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles in the UK, following its US network debut on Fox, which attracted 18 million viewers. The challenge for Virgin in the UK was to replicate the buzz and excitement which surrounded its US success. And to create something credible, they used the mobile medium as an alternative and innovative way of reaching the, normally hard to reach, target audience of 16-34 year old males.

Incentivated created a campaign that allowed users to ‘send’ a Terminator to a friend’s mobile. Users could personalise the film and forward it to friends directly from their own mobile, spreading the buzz further. It was a unique personal experience that turned everyone’s mobile device into a new show-off experience.

The campaign utilises mobile’s unique location based ability to locate the position of the receiver’s mobile phone at that exact moment. This position is sent back via the mobile network and entered into the video. This element really makes this campaign stand out with the WOW factor required by Virgin 1. The recipient can forward the message onto further friends from their phone from www.terminate-a-mate.mobi,and hence create a great viral campaign.

By using triangulation/GPS you could see which areas of the country were desperate to Terminate their mates. And in terms of relationship marketing, the campaign actually ended a relationship! The Mirror ran a story about the wife of an Essex builder who caught him out, when he showed the film on his mobile and she noticed his location on the street of his ex-girlfriend earlier that day.

However, the campaign was compliant with legislation governing mobile privacy. No information is passed on except location based on nearest cell site, which the terminated person’s operator supplies in order to pull the correct map for display on their handset. The person’s location is never known by the terminator, and no personal, financial or operational data is disclosed about the mate being terminated.

The Overall results:

Around 3,500 personalised videos were sent in the first month following the launch of the campaign. The campaign also generated Virgin 1’s largest-ever audience (400% higher than their previous highest-rated show)

Reebok You Got Rondo’d

2009-07-03T08:27:00.000-07:00

In 2008, the Boston Celtics reached the NBA final for the first time in over 20 years. Reebok wanted to create a campaign that would magnify the excitement and magic of this sporting moment. Inside Mobile created a campaign that also a winner at the MAMA's 2009.

Between the qualification of the Boston Celtics and the Finals, they had only 8 days to turn around the campaign from creative to delivery. At the MAMA's, Chris Cannacott, from Inside Mobile revealed the secrets behind their success.

Their first objective were to activate the Reebok brand during the highest profile basketball series, the NBA Finals. Secondly, they needed to establish authenticity and credibility in the basketball category through one of their hottest assets. Last but not least was to create brand awareness between player Rajon Rondo and Reebok.

Their insight was that Rondo, a Reebok sponsored player, was their #1 asset in the NBA Finals. Rondo was an athlete yet to be given real exposure but whose young and exciting style would appeal to their target demographic. His crafty on-court wizardry and never-back-down attitude meant he was popular with the fans. So, they wanted to build on his growing popularity.

The creativity of the communication and delivery of the solution was based around the concept of “You Got Rondo’d”, i.e. you’ve been outmanoeuvred by Rondo’s skill.They allowed people to sign up to be part of a rallying cry during the finals so whenever Rondo performed a signature move, a virtual “button” was pushed that automatically triggered calls to thousands of mobile phones. From inside the stadium to, right across the US, phones rang out with the ringtone “You Got Rondo’d” whenever he made a great play.

When people picked up the calls, they heard further messages from ex-Celtics legends providing an instant payoff for the consumer in real time as they watched the game unfold. It was made possible through the use of emerging Interactive Voice Response (IVR) technology coupled with an interactive mobile site, where fans downloaded the free ringtone and opted in to these IVR ringbacks during each game.

The campaign ran with supporting ads on mobile, YouTube clips, web banners and campaign sites. Other marketing activities included street teams handed out flyers in and around the stadiums and bars and they even had videos on the stadium JumboTron.

Operators can drive more revenue from SMS

2009-06-22T08:13:00.000-07:00

Mobile advertising is an area that a huge number of buying agencies, creative teams and advertisers are trying to nail. But what kind of advertising is worthwhile to the actual mobile operators that enable the majority of this content? Eddie Callaghan, Business Development Manager for Jinny, an Irish mobile advertising solutions agency, spoke at the MAMA's, and examined the different mobile advertising channels.

The predicted increase in advertising spend between now and 2013, depending on who you ask, is between 7.6 and 19 billion euro. Both of these are massively inflated, especially given current economic conditions. Mobile advertising will be worth money, but almost certainly not that much. So what’s a reliable revenue stream? Well, voice and text are the most commonly used mobile services world-wide - but these services are gradually decreasing in value as price wars continue. So operators need to pursue new revenue streams.

There are a staggering number of channels to be pursued in mobile advertising - MMS, SMS, idle screen, ringback, interstitial, applications… the list goes on. It would be far too time and effort intensive to fill all the channels, so operators have to pick the right one. The higher penetration channels like SMS can carry a very limited amount of content. The channels that allow greater content (like apps, games, interstitials) have much lower reach - there may be 4 billion handsets worldwide, but only 17 million are iPhones.

Banner advertising doesn’t really work either - it’s something that has been inherited it from the online web without considering whether it really works on the mobile Internet. Mobile Web usage may be high in some markets, but globally it’s TINY. It is growing, but operators need to know far more about consumer behavior before they can make proper choices. Display ads that appear on-portal only account for a tiny percentage of overall actions on mobile advertising, somewhere around 2-4%. Off-portal sites do much better - almost entirely because they vastly outnumber the amount of operator portals. And now on-portal ads have transcoded mobile Internet pages to compete with as well.

So what about SMS? It’s certainly not as flashy as other forms, but it has unrivalled penetration. Every mobile handset can already use text messages, so there are no technological obstacles. It is currently the most commonly used form of advertising, but that’s mostly in the format of unwanted spam ads. Several companies offer “SMS Ad Insertion” - which fills unused space at the end of text messages with advertising. For example, bank balance request SMS from banks. And since these ads are sent to a specific handset instead of being scattershot, advanced targeting techniques can be applied to make sure the ad is relevant.

Opportunities are huge in emerging markets - but operators can’t use on-line advertising methods. Due to wide ownership of extremely low-tier handsets, operators are pretty much forced to use SMS. Vodafone used SMS Ad Insertion, combined with a click-to-call link in the SMS itself, to inform people about AIDS in areas of Africa where the disease is a serious problem. The campaign was massively successful, and Vodafone is planning several more along the same lines.

Searching for an effective mobile advertising business model

2009-06-22T08:02:00.000-07:00

There was an aboslutely cracking panel discussion at MAMA's on “searching for an effective mobile advertising business model”. This talk drew together some real heavyweights from the mobile industry. The main subjects of the panel were what the big challenges facing mobile advertising are, traditional vs. “futurist” mobile advertising and what consumers want/are willing to pay for.

Moderator:
Ian Mullins, CEO, Yamgo - mobile TV and video experts

Panelists:
Renault Ménérat - Co-Founder, User Adgents - mobile media agency specialising in advertising and search
Dr. Alexander Trommen - CMO, United Mobile AG - an MVNO that deals with voice and data roaming
Scott Lyons - Director, International Business Development, Motorola - searches for new apps across all domains for mobile devices
Jonathan MacDonald - MD, JMA - mobile advertising guru

Mod - what do you see as the big challenges for mobile advertising?

RM - it depends on who you’re advertising for. We deal mostly with content providers, which is quite easy. They have a clear idea of what mobile marketing can offer them. These companies are ready to spend a lot of money, and they are familiar with the territory. As a result, the challenge is to find the appropriate approach to their audience. There are a lot of different channels for mobile advertising, and you have to be very careful to choose the right one to reach your clients intended audience.

AT - The challenge facing mobile advertising is twofold. First, there is the problem of reach - mobile is still a very small medium. Selling 400 ringtones might be great for a small company, but it’s useless for big brands. Second, there are no standards! When you have a company like Microsoft creating it’s own barcoding standard, when there is proven, reliable tech like Kaywa around, you have a problem. This market seems incapable of creating standards. So when you combine the two problems of small reach and very diverse and complicated technology, it makes it ridiculously expensive to achieve reach. I wouldn’t regard mobile as the first place to go to for marketing. We need to educate standards - reach will take care of itself.

SL - The problem with standards is a good point. From a manufactuers perspective, I’m consatantly challenged by operators. We would love to embed advertising on the native apps and services on mobile devices. We will be providing a “premium” media player on future devices, for which we won’t charge the consumer - we’ll be using advertising to pay for it. There is a lot of concern around advertising on mobile in terms of standards: what kind of ads are you getting, where do they go, who shares the revenue? If advertising is ON the device, and PART of the experience, it will be much better. “Spotify” is a good example, even if it’s web based - but we would like to have advertising running in the background, non-invasively.

JM - We tend to wish that we’ll get great mobile advertising that is somehow unobtrusive as well - but maybe we’re looking at this from the wrong angle. I suspect we’re trying to apply old traditions to a new market. We’re approaching this as a TECHNICAL challenge, rather than as a personal channel. We need a psychological change, not a technical one. Traditional types of advertising tend not to work on mobile. Take display advertising, which we’ve just taken wholesale from the on-line web. Display ads have a 99% fail rate on-line, so why push it to a media that isn’t designed for it? This device has the potential to reach 4 billion people - we need to abandon traditional advertising plans and apply a new one.

Mod - What business models are you using, are you making money, and how do you think they’ll evolve?

JM - The model I would like is to help brands create armies of fanatics that they can converse WITH. That has significant revenues.

SL - Motorola is not making money from mobile advertising yet, but the opportunity to make money is there.

AT - Great campaigns only come along once or twice a year - it’s hard for a small company to make a splash. I’ve been trying to get away from display advertising for years. A German TV station refused to use a measurable advertising system like shortcodes, because the metrics would give too much away. After years of making huge amounts of money in vague areas, they didn’t want to become transparent. Many traditional advertising bodies are afraid of change, and so they’re not adapting to the changes that are happening anyway.

SL - And that is a problem of the advertising industry as a whole. People are comfortable using the methods that made them rich in the 70’s and 80’s. Because of that behaviour, there’s a lot of culling going on right now. The problem with revenue sharing is that there’s so many small slices of pie that none of them are worth anything. I would rather forego revenue share and see some innovation.

Mod - one of the key areas to drive mobile is entertainment, and one of key things about the iPhone is that consumers are actually willing to pay for a good app. So which is a better model: ad-funded content or pay per view?

SL - We’ve seen some good ad-funded apps. We’ve also seen some good apps that ARE adverts - Guinness did an excellent advertising app where you drink a virtual pint on your iPhone. In terms of music or video, I think consumers would be willing to tolerate advertising in order to get it cheap or free. I really think it’s possible.

JM - The problem is that companies like AdMob sell 40 trillion ads per day. The advertising method seems to be to put as many ads in as possible, with a philosophy of “where can we slip ads in where they’ll be tolerated?” It’s making us look like sleazy car salesmen. We can talk about this kind of advertising to each other all day, but we speak an alien language compared to the people on the street - this kind of thinking can’t continue.

Mod to JM - So what do you think people want?

JM - the same things they’ve wanted throughout history. The freedom to choose; to protect their privacy; to access their own info; for experiences to suit them and their friends; and to access concierge-style services that help them tailor their experience. I’ve been called a “futurist” but these are all ancient human drives and wants.

There followed a great exchange between SL and JM, which really highlighted the differences between good user-experience and the need to make a profit:

SL - Let’s look at the reality here. If you’re serving up entertainment content, that content needs to be PAID for.

JM - you’re justifiying advertising?

SL - I’m not justifying it, but it’s about serving up premium content in an affordable way - we have to use ads to make this content free to the end-user. But we also have to use advertising that doesn’t trouble the end user.

JM - Why? If you treat people like friends, then great things happen. If you treat them like strangers, nothing good happens. Current advertising is like walking into a private dinner party and shouting at people. The only way to be inside a private dinner party is to be invited.

SL - That’s a very nice idea, but unfortunately we don’t live in that world. Good content needs to be paid for somewhere along the line.

MAMA AWARDS - Winners

2009-05-08T08:10:00.000-07:00

MAMA 2009 - WINNERS
07 May 2009, Charing Cross Hotel, London: The MAMA 2009 was a resounding success. The awards received high quality entries this year and it was encouraging to see that the participants were diverse in nature, coming from both private and public sectors, large enterprises and smaller ones. This overwhelming response demonstrates how the MAMA’s has become a popular awards ceremony in the mobile industry. Visiongain is pleased to announce the winners of the 2nd Annual MAMA Awards in the following categories:-

Best creativity or innovation in mobile marketing and advertising

Gold - Turkcell for Tone & Win
Silver - 2ergo for Mobile Site Builder
Bronze - Prim’Vision for Prim’Mobi

Best use of mobile in driving new revenue and sales

Gold - Upstream for Skill-Based SMS Mega Promotion
Silver - UNKASOFT ADVERGAMING for Advergaming On The Fly
Bronze - IMImobile for mVaayoo

Best ad-enabled application

Gold - Prim’Vision for Prim’Mobi
Silver - IMImobile for Ad-Ring
Bronze - Javna Mobile Media Network for JMN Mobinet

Best network for delivery of mobile advertising and marketing

Gold - JumpTap for JumpTap Premium Mobile Ad Network
Silver - Turkcell for Permission Database
Bronze - BuzzCity for BuzzCity Mobile Internet Advertising Network

Best location-based advertising technology

Gold - Useful Networks Europe for AdWhere Location-Base Advertising Platform
Silver - Marvellous Mobile for Adidas Marathon Tracker
Bronze - Incentivated for Terminators: Terminate-a-mate.com

Best Integrated & cross platform strategy utilising mobile marketing

Gold - 2ergo for Army National Guard “Warrior” Campaign
Silver - Netxcell for MOBISMART
Bronze - Javna Mobile Media Network for MobiAd

Best billing provider
Winner - txtNation for mENABLE Widget

Best use of mobile in brand building
Winner - Marvellous Mobile for Diet Coke Silver Room

Best viral aspect to a campaign
Winner - Inside Mobile for Reebok You Got Rondo’d

Best mobile advertising & marketing company of the year
Winner - AdMob -

More news to follow...

Tele2 signs Dutch MVNO network deal with T-Mobile

2009-02-20T07:40:00.000-08:00

Swedish telecoms firm Tele2 said on Thursday that it had signed a deal with T-Mobile, owned by Deutsche Telekom, to provide network services for its mobile customers in the Netherlands. Tele2 Netherlands, with around 450,000 mobile users, offers service to its customers without operating its own network, acting as a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO).

Harri Koponen, Tele 2's CEO said in a statement the deal would give the company improved margins in an already profitable market. Tele 2 gave no further financial details.

Industry sources said earlier this week that Tele 2 was planning the move. One source said that Tele 2 had previously been buying wholesale capacity from KPN.

Visa works with GSMA to extend access to mobile financial services

2009-02-20T07:36:00.000-08:00

Visa has announced plans to work with the GSM Association to advance the delivery of mobile financial services around the world. As part of the continuing collaboration between the two organisations, the GSMA has selected Visa as a provider for mobile money transfer solutions globally, and is working to execute an agreement to formalise participation terms. Visa is already providing money transfer solutions with active programmes in 14 countries in Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

Elizabeth Buse, Global Head of Product for Visa said, "By combining the world’s largest retail electronic payments network and the world’s most popular wireless technology, we can take Visa beyond the card to mobile handsets, a move that can help accelerate the deployment of mobile payment services."

EC to force change to mobile fees rules

2009-02-20T07:35:00.000-08:00

The EC said on Thursday that the European policymakers will push through rules to cut mobile phone bills in the region despite opposition from member states and aim to have a new regulatory framework in place by April, the FT reports on its website.

Interconnection fees are the latest front in a protracted battle between mobile phone operators and Brussels. EU regulations have pared back the price of overseas roaming for voice calls, and proposals to cap the price of data transfers are being discussed.

Twelve countries, including Germany, the UK and Spain, voted against plans by Viviane Reding, the European telecoms commissioner, to force operators to cut the amounts they charge each other for carrying calls across their networks.

A spokesman for Ms Reding said the plans had 'wide support' in the EU and would be adopted by the Commission in early April. Ms Reding is pushing for the charges to reflect the cost to the operator, arguing that higher fees act as a barrier to competition and a subsidy from small operators to large ones.

Nokia prepares to cut half of its sales division

2009-02-19T09:39:00.002-08:00

Nokia is to axe more than half of its UK advertising sales division as it scales back its commercial presence. The mobile phone giant will focus its advertising sales on other Nokia services, as well as major third-party publishers. The company declined to reveal how many people it employs in its Nokia Interactive Advertising division, or, how many staff will go.

A spokesman said, "There will, unfortunately, be some job losses in the UK office. Nokia continues to believe that advertising will remain a key revenue generator for the future of internet services, and Nokia Interactive Advertising will continue to offer brands advertising opportunities across an increasing range of Nokia services."

Vodafone's chief warns of recession leading to consolidation

2009-02-19T09:39:00.001-08:00

The boss of Vodafone has said that the deepening recession could trigger a wave of consolidation in the mobile phone industry, the Daily Mail reports on its website.

The gravest economic crisis in generations will force more and more operators into defensive partnerships and cost-cutting alliances, according to Vittorio Colao. In a stark warning, the Italian said 'more sharing of assets is required' if mobile companies are to ride out the economic turmoil.

His comments underline how the realities of recession have hit home, with many weaker operators facing little choice but to seek the shelter of bigger rivals. 3, the UK's smallest operator, already shares the cost of building a high speed mobile network with fellow struggler T-Mobile. But the deal is widely seen as a precursor to a full merger.

T-Mobile and Nokia to jointly offer Ovi and operator services

2009-02-19T09:38:00.001-08:00

Nokia and T-Mobile have announced plans to promote together their respective offering for widgets, applications and other content to provide customers with access to a range of Internet services, Cellular-news reports.

The customer can browse and download widgets from both the T-Mobile widget gallery and Nokia's Ovi Store using T-Mobile's web'n'walk widget platform. The integrated marketplace will be available during the second half 2009 on mass market Nokia Series 40 platform based phones.

T-Mobile's web'n'walk widget platform will be supported on Series 40 based feature phones, and a Java based widget client makes it possible for both offerings to co-exist.

Rainer Deutschmann, SVP of Mobile Internet at T-Mobile International said, "T-Mobile and Nokia share a joint vision of offering an unparalleled mobile Internet experience to its customers. The co-existence of our widget gallery with Nokia's Ovi Store ensures customers have access to an extensive range of interesting and relevant Internet services that they can customise according to their personal preferences."

The generic Ovi Store service will be available in early May for consumers. The integrated marketplace with T-Mobile will be available during the second half of 2009.

Analyst says Google’s Android may challenge Microsoft in computers

2009-02-19T09:36:00.000-08:00

Google's Android operating system, after making inroads into the mobile-phone market, may be running on portable computers within the next year, challenging the dominance of Microsoft.

Google could use its brand name and community of developers to get the software onto low-cost notebooks, said Ray Valdes, an analyst at Gartner. One chipmaker, Freescale Semiconductor, is already working on designs for an Android computer.

"Android could be a piece of a larger competitive battle between Google and Microsoft," Valdes said. The analyst expects some kind of personal-computer device to use Android in the next 12 to 18 months.

O2 resolves Facebook access problem

2009-02-19T09:32:00.000-08:00

O2 has worked with Facebook representatives to successfully fix a problem which was stopping mobile broadband users accessing the social networking site.

O2 subscribers were unable to log on to their Facebook accounts earlier in the week with some forced to use a basic iPhone-based interface as a way of getting round the hitch, while other complained on public user forums.

An O2 spokesman has said that the matter had now been dealt with. "We have worked with Facebook and a third party supplier to establish a resolution to the problem. The issue was resolved by a routing change in the third party's network. The cause of the issue is currently under investigation," he said.

Incorporating the Skype experience with the N Series

2009-02-18T08:52:00.000-08:00

At the mobile world congress in Barcelona, Skype and Nokia announced a partnership that will bring VoIP experience to the Nokia range of mobile computers. Under the terms of the cooperation, Skype will be integrated into Nokia devices, starting with the Nokia Nseries. The Nokia N97 flagship device will be the first to incorporate the Skype experience in the third quarter of 2009.

The Skype experience will be part of the address book of the Nokia N97, enabling presence, seeing when Skype contacts are online, as well as instant messaging. Nokia N97 owners will also be able to use 3G and WLAN to make and receive free Skype-to-Skype voice calls, in addition to Skype calls to landlines and mobile devices.

Nokia unveils latest 8-megapixel cameraphone

2009-02-18T06:36:00.000-08:00

Nokia's latest handset, the Nokia N86 8MP combines an 8-megapixel camera with wide-angle Carl Zeiss optics that the company says is designed to excel in low light conditions. Juha-Pekka Sipponen, Director of Nokia Nseries said, "People demand mobile cameras that take excellent pictures in all light conditions. That's why the aperture of the Nokia N86 8MP is comparable to that of a high-quality, stand-alone digital camera.

The handset includes a wide-angle Carl Zeiss Tessar lens for panoramic pictures, shorter latencies and variable aperture for super sharp photos in challenging bright and low light conditions. The fast mechanical shutter ensures pictures with less motion blur while the dual LED camera flash is powerful enough for photography and video capture.

Helmut Heier of Carl Zeiss said, "When it comes to taking the best digital photos, it's the quality of the lens and the sensor that count, not just the quantity of pixels. The Nokia N86 8MP is the first mobile device with variable aperture, adding to the Carl Zeiss Tessar lens for excellent results.

HTC and Vodafone jointly launch New Google Phone

2009-02-18T06:26:00.000-08:00

Vodafone and HTC have jointly launched the HTC Magic smartphone, Vodafone's first Android-powered handset, which will be available in the spring. The new handset is exclusive to Vodafone in the UK, Spain, Germany and France and available on a non-exclusive basis in Italy. The HTC Magic will be available in white in the UK, Spain and France, black in Germany and in both colours in Italy, and will be for sale in several other Vodafone markets over the next few months, according to the companies.

Andy Rubin, senior director of Mobile Platforms at Google said, "The announcement of the HTC Magic is an important step for Android and the Open Handset Alliance. With it, Vodafone is opening up the mobile web for consumers across Europe and giving more third-party developers a platform on which they can build the next wave of killer applications."

Rim says BlackBerry’s profit margin decline may be permanent

2009-02-17T10:29:00.000-08:00

Research In Motion (RIM) Co-CEO James Balsillie said shrinking BlackBerry profit margins may be partly permanent, Bloomberg reports.

"Some of it was permanent, some of it is temporary, and we see lots of ways to earn that back and we invest to earn that back," Balsillie said on Monday.

"If we didn’t have the market share growth, if we didn’t have the sales acceleration, if we didn’t have the subscriber acceleration, I might be concerned. If sales are going up and we’re gaining market share, the stock market is irrelevant," Balsillie said.

O2 hopes to reach deal on UK spectrum

2009-02-17T10:27:00.000-08:00

O2's head said on Monday that the company is hoping to reach a deal with Britain's telecoms regulator over giving up some of its spectrum for use by competitors, Reuters reports.
Ofcom is proposing that O2, owned by Spain's Telefonica and its rival Vodafone, give up about 10MHz of spectrum which could be auctioned to rivals. Ronan Dunne, O2 UK CEO said, "The government has asked all the operators in the UK to sit together and, assisted by the government, to come to an industry solution."

The sector could come up with an acceptable solution for the government involving a more efficient use of the spectrum in terms of cost, he said. Operators have about two months to propose something which is acceptable to Ofcom, Dunne added.
Ofcom hopes to auction the spectrum freed up in the summer of 2010 to competitors including T-Mobile and France Telecom's Orange.

Microsoft revamps mobile offering

2009-02-17T09:11:00.000-08:00

Microsoft said on Monday that it has joined a growing number of companies in the industry launching or revamping online stores for consumers to download and install software directly to their phones for services such as finding directions or playing games, Reuters reports.
The company also rebranded its wireless offering to Windows from Windows Mobile, and launched a backup service for data, like contacts and pictures, stored on Windows phones.

Orange to sell LG wrist-watch phone

2009-02-17T09:02:00.000-08:00

Orange has said that it will be the first operator to offer the LG Watch phone (LG G910) in Europe, Cellular-news reports.

Yves Maitre, SVP of Devices at Orange said, "This phone really manages to combine form with functionality and its chic styling and mobile broadband connectivity will no doubt appeal to all the early adopters out there."

Harrison Lee, SVP & Head of European Mobile Business at LG said, "Orange’s long heritage in mobile innovation and its proven success at bringing such technologies to its customers means it is an ideal partner to bring the world’s first Touch Watch Phone to Europe." The wrist watch style phone comes with a blue-tooth headset and features a full touch-screen interface, 3G HSDPA and video-calling capabilities.

HSPA to dominate mobile deployments

2009-02-17T08:59:00.000-08:00

Ericsson CEO Carl-Henric Svanberg noted that, while his company is determined to push itself as a leader in LTE the bulk of mobile broadband deployments in the coming five years will be based on HSPA, unstrung.com reports. He presented a forecast of the broadband world in 2014 that showed 3.5 billion high-speed access lines globally, about 80 per cent of which would be via wireless, rather than fixed, connections.

Of those three billion projected mobile broadband lines, about 70 per cent will be HSPA, forecasts Ericsson, which hopes to be able to reap the rewards of its HSPA investments for many years to come.

VODAFONE TO PRE-INSTALL OPERA BROWSERS INTO MOBILE PHONES

2009-02-17T08:56:00.000-08:00

Vodafone has signed an agreement with Opera Software to develop a custom-made version of the mobile browser Opera Mini for the operator's low and mid range handsets, Cellular-news reports.
Opera Mini will be available in Vodafone markets across Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Africa.

In early trials in Vodafone Egypt, more than 400,000 customers downloaded the product in a month.

As part of the global framework agreement with Opera Software, selected Vodafone operating companies will be able to pre-embed the Vodafone version of the Opera Mini browser on Java-based portfolio handsets or encourage customers to download it themselves.

Nokia Services head plays down Facebook talk

2009-02-17T08:47:00.000-08:00

Nokia sees social networking site Facebook as only one of many partners for its Ovi online software store, Reuters reports.

Niklas Savander, EVP for services said, "In general I think you will see lot more cooperation between Nokia and a number of developers. Facebook is a good example of a company that has traction in the market... (but) I wouldn't put too much drama into this versus any other partnership right now."

Some media reports have speculated that Nokia and Facebook would announce a cooperation deal at the trade fair. On Monday, Facebook was listed among the partners for Nokia's Ovi software store along with other companies including rival social networking site MySpace.