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:

It’s the telecoms industry deal of the year. T-Mobile and Orange form a joint venture. The UK’s "big five" networks (or "big four", depending on your predilection for Hutchison 3G UK) will now be a "big four" (or "big three", if you don’t include 3. Confused yet?)

Everyone has an opinion. On Tuesday I was asked for mine.

Mark Bridge writes:

Once upon a time, I’d probably have described myself as a feminist. These days I probably wouldn’t. Not because my opinions have changed, just because I’ve realised there are a lot of women who’d argue that I can’t be a feminist because of my male undercarriage. And me, by birth and possibly by education, therefore being part of the problem – not part of the solution.

Right, disclaimer over. I’ll get to the point. You want a mobile phone that’ll appeal to men...

Mark Bridge writes:

Mobile phones fry your brain. That’s been a warning from some people pretty much since the first cellphones appeared. And although the mobile phone industry has changed and the technology has advanced, the warnings haven’t gone away.

Ten years ago, the Independent Expert Group on Mobile Phones was set up to look at concerns about the possible health effects from the use of mobile phones, base stations and transmitters.

Mark Bridge writes:

Enthusiasm is one of the great intangible powers of the world. It’s attractive, it’s compelling and sometimes it’s dangerous. And – yes, I’m going to try to keep this relevant – it sells mobile phones.

I was reminded of this the other day when I read a Sunday Times article about Apple’s Steve Jobs.

Mark Bridge writes:

Marketing, not unlike football, is a funny old game. I don’t claim to be an expert in either… but every so often something happens that starts sowing the seeds of doubt in my mind. And no, I’m not thinking about Liverpool's penalty claims in Sunday’s game at Tottenham. I’m thinking about Blyk.

Here at The Fonecast, we like Blyk. They shook up the industry and worried some of the big names when they arrived with their youth-focussed virtual mobile network two years ago. We interviewed their MD Shaun Gregory in May last year. And now they’re quitting the MVNO game in favour of arranging advertising deals for networks.

The new Microsoft Band, the Samsung Galaxy A smartphones and the Huawei Honor 6 are all discussed in this week's podcast.

We also look at some of the mobile industry's other big stories, including Amazon UK's mobile phone deals, the Lenovo purchase of Motorola Mobility, LG's quarterly results and the anticipated increase in WiFi hotspots.

This week's podcast begins with the latest news from Phones 4u, where hundreds of jobs have been saved but there are a large number of redundancies as well.

Iain, James and Mark then talk about new products from Amazon, BlackBerry and Panasonic, mobile payment innovation from Indonesia and the UK, the acquisition of IoT specialist Neul and Apple's updated privacy policy.

Iain Graham, James Rosewell and Mark Bridge start this week's podcast by looking back at the launch of the iPhone 6, the Apple Watch and the Apple Pay service.

They then move on to discuss the troubles at Phones 4u, a UK smartphone launch from O2, another smartphone launch that's been put on hold, Microsoft's gaming plans - and more.

In this podcast Mark Bridge talks to Florent Stroppa from mobile value-added service specialist OnMobile about the state of the mobile industry in 2014.

They discuss the dominance of Apple and Samsung, network consolidation, the new Amazon Fire smartphone, smart wearables and much more.

This week's podcast covers the launch of the first Amazon smartphone and the introduction of Google Glass to the UK.

We also talk about new WiFi-powered voice services from EE and Three, plans to reduce mobile 'black spots', BlackBerry's app partnership, smartphone theft, 4G innovation... and rechargeable trousers.