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Saturday, June 11, 2011

This week at The Fonecast: 11th June 2011

Mark Bridge writes:

On Monday there seemed to be a dearth of mobile news as the industry held its breath and waited for Steve Jobs to speak.

Why there was quite so much breath-holding beats me, because Apple had already told us what the announcement was going to cover. Anyway, we learned about iOS 5, which will arrive in the autumn, and its 200 new features – including a new messaging service called iMessage. Will it kill SMS?  I think not. And where on earth do they get the names from?

In other product news, HP announced its webOS tablet will arrive in July with a retail price of around £399. I’ll be honest, there doesn’t seem to be quite as much excitement here.

Now to legal issues – but for a change we’re not talking who’s suing who. Or whom. Two former employees of T-Mobile UK who stole customer information and sold it to other businesses have told to pay a total of £73,700 in fines and confiscation costs. They’ll only be jailed if they don’t pay up quickly, which may be a disappointment to the Information Commissioner who’d previously said a prison sentence was required as a deterrent.

Elsewhere, there are complaints that Ofcom’s planned 4G auction could be illegal – which could mean delays to the launch of LTE in the UK – and other complaints that the merging of Orange and T-Mobile’s UK networks breaches a contract with infrastructure firm Arqiva.

Talking of Everything Everywhere, it’s planning 30 new own-brand shops. Looks like the five store trial went well.

And finally to departures. Last week we heard that Three UK CEO Kevin Russell was heading back to Australia. Now Marc Allera, the company’s sales and marketing director, is off. Coincidence? I’ve got no idea. And leaving the GSMA after 12 years is Rob Conway. The organisation doesn’t have a successor confirmed at the moment.

Good luck, chaps. I’m sure this isn’t the last we’ve heard of you.


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Opinion Articles

The art of accessory sales is changing

Mark Bridge writes:

We're told it's not merely 'sales'. No, it's an art. "The art of selling". And with over 4 million hits on Google, you could easily argue that the art of selling is more popular than painting.

The same goes for the two sub-categories of cross-selling and up-selling. They're arts as well, you know. Mystic and creative disciplines...

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‘The App is Dead. Long Live the App’ at Mobile World Congress

James Rosewell writes:

Apps (defined as games, information services, social networking video and web content among other things) dominated MWC10 with debate focused on the provision of radio network capacity to support them, the technologies used to create them and the methods for Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) to monetise them. Given the fragmentation in technology and the investment needed from MNOs to provide capacity coupled with a lack of reward for MNOs, we would be forgiven for thinking the App as we know it is not long for this world. However new technologies offering broader platform support, plus smart network investment coupled with new business models, mean the App will evolve and come of age ready for 2011.

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Windows Phone 7 Series at Mobile World Congress

Mark Bridge writes:

We queued in the rain outside the Catalonia Barcelona Plaza hotel. We sat on the floor in a basement room. And we watched on TV as Steve Ballmer announced Windows Phone 7 Series.

The life of a reporter is not a glamorous one.

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HTC Smart could start a smartphone price war

Mark Bridge writes:

I’ve previously talked about a report from 2009 which warned how touch-screen phones that weren’t true smartphones were pushing down ARPU. Consumers thought they were buying something that was relatively advanced but were being seduced by form over function.

This week HTC stepped in to the arena with the HTC Smart, described by HTC's Peter Chou as "a more-affordable smartphone". Although it may not fit everyone’s definition of a smartphone, it certainly ticks most of the boxes. It has an open operating system, Qualcomm’s Brew platform, which has over 18,000 available applications and has been installed on over 1200 handset models worldwide.

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