France Télécom, which has traded as ‘Orange’ within France and abroad for several years, is formally changing the company name to Orange on 1st July 2013. The decision was taken at the shareholders’ AGM today.

Originally a French government department, France Telecom became a separate business in 1990 and was later privatised.

Last year the European Commission requested information from Deutsche Telecom, France Télécom, Telefónica, Vodafone and Telecom Italia as well as from the GSMA.

It was concerned that standards for future mobile communications services shouldn’t be used by mobile operators as part of a strategy to close other companies down.

France Telecom-Orange has formed a global strategic partnership with mobile security company Lookout.

From early next year, Orange customers in France, Slovakia, Spain and the UK - along with EE and T-Mobile customers in the UK - will have the Lookout Mobile Security application installed as standard on selected new Android devices. The software will help consumers protect their smartphones against malware, data loss, privacy threats and loss or theft.

Everything Everywhere, which runs the UK networks of T-Mobile and Orange, has announced its financial results for the final quarter and full year of 2011.

It says service revenue was up 2.1% if the effects of Mobile Termination Rate cuts are ignored - or down 2.1% when the impact of MTR cuts is included.

Orange Austria is to be sold to Hutchison 3G Austria, subject to regulatory approval.

France Telecom-Orange currently owns 35% of the business, while Mid Europa Partners controls 65%. Both parties have agreed to sell their combined stakes to Hutchison.

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?

This week we're talking about BlackBerry's options for the future, Vodafone's 4G launch, Apple's patent victory and LG's new smartphone.

We also discuss ZTE selling its Firefox phones on eBay, Nokia's acquisition of NSN, the cost of phone calls in Europe, the controversy about recycling bins that monitor footfall and the new face promoting HTC.

The Motorola Moto X smartphone opens this week's show, despite not having a European release... but there's plenty of other UK news.

We talk about O2's plans to launch 4G mobile services later this month, we look at the ASA's ruling against EE, we contemplate the government's plans to eliminate some mobile 'black spots', we wonder when Android's market share will start to shrink - and we discuss many other mobile telecom stories as well.

James Rosewell interviews Ruth Barnett, head of communications at British-based technology company SwiftKey.

As well as talking about the SwiftKey keyboard app they also discuss competition in the mobile application space, working with manufacturers and the opportunities presented by 'Bring Your Own Device' schemes.

In this week's show we look at Google's new product announcements, O2's closure of its mobile telecare service and the clearance of radio frequencies for 4G services.

We also talk about the latest collection of quarterly results from Apple, Samsung, Amazon, LG and Facebook. Who's doing well - and should anyone be worried?

We start this week's show by discussing the recent quarterly results from Google, Nokia, Vodafone and Microsoft.

There's also time to talk about SIM security, Ubuntu's crowd-funded smartphone, the HTC One mini, smart watches and an unusual process for recharging your phone battery.