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.

Natasha Cooper writes:

As someone who has been through more iPhone screens than I’d like to remember, when I recently upgraded to an iPhone 5s I was keen to keep it in one piece - for a few months at least. Cue the new CAT Active Urban Phone Case, which claims to protect your phones from falls of up to 1.8 meters using a reinforced material that can also be found in protective equipment for motor bike riders.

Analyst firm Ovum has published its mobile payment and mobile advertising predictions for this year.

Ovum expects continued technology and service innovation, notably around location-based applications, in the mobile payments space in 2014. However, there will be increasing complexity within the mobile payments ecosystem this year, and on-going challenges around the business model for digital wallet services.

Mark Bridge writes:

Farewell for another year, dear old International CES. The Las Vegas-based consumer electronics show is but a fading memory as the mobile industry starts preparing for next month’s GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

However, what happened in Vegas doesn’t stay in Vegas.

Mark Bridge writes:

In a way, it’s hard to believe that the first Apple iPhone wasn’t seen in public until this day seven years ago. It - and the trend towards one-piece smartphones with hardly any buttons - seems to have been with us for much longer.

Mark Bridge writes:

'Twas the week before Christmas, when all thro' the mobile industry
came a sudden burst of news-related activity.

This week's podcast begins with a new keenly-priced flagship smartphone from Huawei. We then move on to talk about a UK price promise from Vodafone, mobile payments, feature phone upgrades, WiFi hotspots and the benefits of a Carphone/Dixons merger.

Iain Graham, James Rosewell and Mark Bridge condense all the biggest mobile industry news headlines from the past 7 days into a free 30-minute podcast.

There's plenty of product news in this week's podcast, with a new Apple iPad and new tablets from Nokia and Argos as well.

We also talk about HMV's battle with the Apple App Store, new 4G tariffs from Tesco Mobile, Samsung's patent proposals and a complaint about coverage maps.

Facebook's flotation is the big news story this week - but there's plenty more to talk about, including two new UK virtual networks, the launch of a new mobile payment service and mobile WiFi arriving on cross-channel trains.

James Rosewell and Mark Bridge report from Mobile World Congress 2012 in Barcelona. In today's programme they discuss Tuesday's news from the GSMA, Eric Schmidt's keynote speech, and the iZettle mobile payment service.

This week we're covering a wide range of news stories, from Adobe's mobile Flash plans to the iZettle payment app. We discuss eBay's plea to the UK government, a new UK 4G trial, a potential new threat to iPhones... and much more.