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Ofcom helps protect customers against unexpected roaming charges

Ofcom helps protect customers against unexpected roaming charges

UK service providers must notify customers when they connect to a different network

New rules from UK telecoms regulator Ofcom will protect customers when they use their mobile phone on a foreign network. In addition, customers will be alerted if they are inadvertently roaming, perhaps because they're near an international border.
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Global smartphone market is set for recovery, says new forecast

A new forecast from research specialists Canalys shows the smartphone market is set to recover next year. Worldwide shipments declined by 12% last year but that decline is expected to slow to 5% this year.
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Vodafone and Three plan to merge their UK businesses

Vodafone and Three plan to merge their UK businesses

New Hutchison/Vodafone network would be biggest UK operator

Vodafone Group plc and CK Hutchison Group Telecom Holdings Limited have agreed to combine their UK telecommunication businesses, respectively Vodafone UK and Three UK. The merger will create a large new network operator to compete with Virgin Media O2 and EE.
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UK mobile payment service Paym to close in March 2023

UK mobile payment service Paym will close on 7th March 2023. The service, which allowed users to make and receive payments using their mobile phone numbers, was launched in 2014.
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Qualcomm legal action moves forward in the UK

Qualcomm legal action moves forward in the UK

Which? seeks payout for Samsung and Apple smartphone owners

Consumer protection organisation Which? has been given permission by the UK's Competition Appeal Tribunal to represent Apple and Samsung smartphone buyers in a legal case against chip manufacturer Qualcomm.
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Opinion Articles

Sunday, January 22, 2012

Last week at The Fonecast: 23rd January 2012

Mark Bridge writes:

We’re starting the week with breaking (but not entirely unexpected) news that RIM has a new CEO. Just one, not two. We’ll be talking much more about him in Wednesday’s podcast. In fact, RIM’s announcement concludes a week that’s been packed with big names - and big money as well.

Google, Intel and Microsoft all released quarterly results last week. Intel and Google also had annual figures to crow about, although Google’s share price suffered a bit when ad revenues weren’t as good as some had expected. Intel’s quarterly revenue was $13.9 billion, Google’s was $10.6 billion and Microsoft’s was $20.9 billion, since you asked.

On the other side of the coin there’s Kodak apparently running out of cash. Oh, and there’s Sony Ericsson, which published financial results revealing it had made a loss in 2011. Fortunately, some might say, it’s likely to be the last report from the joint venture before it becomes a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sony.

Vodafone was another company making headlines with money. In this case, India’s Supreme Court ruled that Vodafone wasn’t liable to pay taxes on its acquisition of Hutchison Essar in 2007. The country’s tax authorities had claimed a total of around £2.8 billion was due in taxes and penalty payments.

From big money to big numbers. Almost half of US mobile consumers now have smartphones, according to Nielsen research. (Mind you, the UK is already in the same position). InMobi says mobile advertising traffic more than doubled last year. Low-cost smartphone sales are expected to double this year. There’ll be 530 million mobile banking users next year. And there’ll be 365 million mobile machine-to-machine connections worldwide by 2016.

Finally, bringing things back to earth with a bump, we have good news for the clumsy and the careless. Nissan has created the world’s first self-healing iPhone case, which uses the Scratch Shield paint you can already choose as an option on some Nissan vehicles. Not just a publicity stunt, surely?

Meanwhile construction equipment manufacturer JCB put its name on a new limited edition version of the already-tough Motorola DEFY+ smartphone, giving it an assortment of practical apps and a protective sleeve with re-entrant geometry. Re-entrant-geometry?  Yup, that’s the technical description of a pattern that looks like a tractor tyre. Well, I suppose it gives the story an interesting angle.

Start your week with a reminder of the latest mobile headlines. Simply register at TheFonecast.com by clicking the link at the top right-hand corner of our home page and we’ll send you this weekly news summary by email.
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Recent Podcasts

Tesco gets into smartphones, Facebook gets into advertising... and O2 gets into trouble

Podcast - 7th May 2014

We start this week's podcast with Tesco's plans for a Hudl-branded smartphone. Next comes some potentially good news about the 'patent wars' affecting the mobile industry - although there's certainly no sign of a ceasefire.

Later we discuss an announcement from Facebook about its mobile advertising scheme, an unfortunate mistake for O2's Travel service, a new 20 megapixel camera-phone and an automotive investment by Nokia.

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Bringing video services to smartphones: interview with Jijesh Devan of QuickPlay Media

Podcast - 2nd May 2014

In this interview Mark Bridge talks to Jijesh Devan of QuickPlay Media about the opportunities and challenges of bringing video services to smartphones and other internet-connected devices.

Their conversation took place on the QuickPlay stand inside the App Planet area of Mobile World Congress in February.

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Faulty phones, network closures, court cases, payment apps... and much more mobile industry news

Podcast - 30th April 2014

We have something for everyone in this week's podcast. There's bad news as Samba Mobile closes, bad news as Apple and Samsung suffer product faults... and bad news as wearable devices are criticised for the poor user experience they offer.

Yet there's plenty of good news as well, including the launch of a new UK mobile payment service.

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Seven days of mobile industry news, from money transfers to monster tracking

Podcast - 23rd April 2014

Telefonica sets up its own mobile advertising business, Mozilla puts an interim CEO in place and Nokia suspends sales of its flagship Windows 8.1 RT tablet: all topics for discussion in this week's podcast.

We're also talking about the future growth of Orange Money, EE's online activity, mobile broadband growth and the Loch Ness monster being spotted on Apple iPhones.

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An introduction to embedded mobile security with Loic Hamon of Inside Secure

Podcast - 18th April 2014

When the topics of mobile technology and security are discussed, the conversation can end up focussing on third-party software solutions.

Inside Secure has a different perspective. It's a specialist in embedded security; building protection in from the start. To learn more, Mark Bridge caught up with Loic Hamon, Vice President of Corporate Development at Inside Secure, at the company's hospitality suite during Mobile World Congress.

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