UK telecoms regulator Ofcom wants to ban inflation-related rises in phone and broadband contracts. Instead, it says any potential mid-contract price rises should be set out in pounds and pence.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Mark Bridge writes:

There are bad weeks... and there are BAD weeks. Blackberry had one of the latter. It all started so well. The company announced a new flagship phablet – the Z30 – and said it would be launching its BBM instant messaging service for iOS and Android handsets at the weekend.

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.

Mark Bridge writes:

It’s time to ‘ketchup’ with last week’s biggest mobile industry news stories - and where better to start than with HP’s claims of ‘saucy’ behaviour?  It’s launched an investigation into last year’s acquisition of UK company Autonomy, claiming the software company had ‘spiced up’ its valuation. Condiment-based puns aside, it’s a serious matter that could see key players from the deal charged with cooking the books.

Mark Bridge writes:

Mobile financial services were making the headlines yet again last week. Not once. Not twice. No, we noticed at least three separate (and all pretty big) stories to talk about.

First came Nokia’s planned withdrawal from its mobile money service, which will leave around a million people in India looking for a new mobile wallet.

Mark Bridge writes:

It’s not been a good week for Nokia staff, with 4000 of them likely to lose their jobs from factories in Finland, Hungary and Mexico. The company says it’s moving device assembly to Asia, where it’ll be closer to component manufacturers. The three scaled-down factories will remain open with a new focus on smartphone customisation.

We're looking at the latest mobile industry news and talking to Chris Caudle from the Independent Mobile Phone Dealers Association about his organisation's plans to resolve cashback problems. There's also a quick review of the new Samsung G810 multimedia phone.

This week's edition of 'The Fonecast' visits the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona with a special report from Mobile News online editor Mark Sennett. Iain Graham and Mark Bridge take their usual look at the latest mobile industry headlines - and there's a review of the forthcoming LG KF600 dual-screen phone.

This week's edition of 'The Fonecast' looks at all the latest mobile industry headlines, with a special focus on the proposed Microsoft & Yahoo! merger. We talk to Faisal Sheikh about faulty phones and also review the new Garmin nuvifone.

This week's edition of 'The Fonecast' investigates the recent boom in mobile broadband and USB modem sales by talking to the Commercial Product Manager for Hugh Symons Telecom. There's also a review of the Motorola MOTO U9 and the usual look at mobile industry headlines from the past 7 days.

This week the team look at the Nokia N82, talk to Adrian Foot of "The Phone Shop" about 3's connection policy, take a deeper look at unlocking and firmware upgrades, plus bring you the latest news and rumours.