The new Apple iPad tablets, Google's latest Nexus devices, Android Lollipop, wearable tech from will.i.am and the world's slimmest smartphone all feature in this week's podcast.

We're also talking about free mobile data for Christmas, 4.5G technology being rolled out in the UK, 5G technology being tested in South Korea, the end of an era for webOS and video messages that self-destruct.

There are many mobile boundaries being blurred in this week's podcast.

Topics include Truphone's combined WiFi and mobile service, Skype's move to direct mobile billing, the rise of 4G and an Android-controlled satellite.

Mark Bridge writes:

Mobile networks aren’t what they used to be. As last week’s interview with Vince Russell of The Cloud demonstrated, more and more customers are relying on WiFi to augment their mobile data service.

Truphone is now planning to do exactly the same with voice calls and text messages by linking its mobile network with WiFi for even wider coverage.

Voice over IP service Skype has announced the first countries where customers will be able to use its direct mobile operator billing option. This will let customers pay for Skype credit by charging it to their mobile phone account.

The facility has just been launched in Russia and will soon be enabled in the USA and Canada as well.

Mark Bridge writes:

We’re moving into that time of year where product announcements are replaced by promotional campaigns and sales figures. Apple revealed it had sold three million assorted iPad tablets in just three days, while Samsung said its Galaxy SIII smartphone had sold more than 30 million units since its launch in May.

Mark Windle, head of marketing at OpenCloud, predicts that this year’s reduction in the number of traditional telecoms operators in some countries will provide an opportunity for other operators to innovate and capture market share in 2016.

He says next year will be a year of rapid change for telecoms… whether it’s MVNO disruption, competitive tariff pricing or simply defence from the ‘dark art’ of hacking.

Mark Bridge writes:

The most memorable moments in life often go unrecorded. You don't have your camera in your hands. Your finger is still hovering over the 'pause' button on your audio recorder. Or you were simply too busy experiencing whatever was happening. It's all about the one that got away.

That's where Kapture can help.

Mark Bridge writes:

James Rosewell shows me a colourful roll of paper that's the width of an iPhone but well over three metres long. When I look closer, I can see it's a printed copy of the Wall Street Journal's mobile website. That's a lot of scrolling to do... and a pretty unfriendly user experience for anyone reading the news online. Why does it work so badly?

We begin this week's programme by looking at Vodafone's acquisition plans in Spain before moving on to discuss universal mobile chargers and 4G roaming.

There's also time to talk about UK mobile coverage, EE's new customer tracking service, contactless transactions and a smartphone camera that can identify objects hidden behind something else.

This year's Mobile World Congress was notable for the number of product launches by handset manufacturers. To get a better understanding of smartphone manufacturing, we spoke to Johan Lodenius of semiconductor company MediaTek.

He gave us a simple overview of how 'fabless' manufacturing works, discussed developments in smartphones and wearable devices, contemplated the end of the PC era and talked about the importance of driving costs down.

This week's programme opens with a quick look at David Cameron's commitment to 5G technology and the Internet of Things, which was made in a speech at CeBIT.

Iain and Mark then move on to talk about the other big mobile news headlines from the past few days, including the forthcoming Paym m-payment service, new HTC and LG smartphones, the growth of Chinese handset manufacturers, wearable devices, in-car connectivity and damaged iPhones.

Messaging was very much on the agenda at Mobile World Congress this year, following Facebook's announcement that it was planning to acquire WhatsApp in a 19 billion dollar deal. So if the future for this type of internet-based 'over the top' messaging service looks good, what does this mean for SMS?

To find out more, we spoke to Stacy Adams of mBlox to learn what was happening in the messaging world, to find out how SMS is being integrated with mobile apps - and to discover some of the other ways SMS was being used by businesses today.

Even at Mobile World Congress, the relevance of the mobile network operator can sometimes be forgotten. So for a different perspective on this year's event, we spoke to Samuel Johnston from British mobile crowd-sourcing firm OpenSignal.

Samuel discussed the announcements from MWC14 and OpenSignal's latest report into 4G LTE coverage around the world, as well as giving us an exclusive insight into OpenSignal's next research subject.