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.

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.

Anjana Pasricha from voanews.com writes:

India’s millions of mobile phone subscribers have won relief from a growing nuisance on the subcontinent - unsolicited text messages. The crackdown by regulators targets the world’s fastest-growing mobile phone market.

From remote villages to crowded metros, the number of mobile phones in India has grown exponentially to more than 850 million in just over a decade.

Mark Bridge writes:

It’s time for my summary of last week’s mobile industry news… and what a week it’s been. Not just for me – I made my first-ever visit to Over The Air on Friday – but for the world of mobile devices.

Mark Bridge writes:

The text message just said "Yellow Citroën hatchback".  At least the diaeresis on the ë was in the right place. It meant the stranger who was giving me a lift from the station was probably an urbane French speaker. Either that, or they had surprisingly good predictive text on their phone. The third possibility - a serial killer with an old Sagem - hadn't crossed my mind yet.

It was at this point I realised I'd already fallen for Over The Air, a unique event aimed at mobile developers. Throwing caution to the wind, I'd arranged a lift there via Twitter with a mysterious developer I'd never met. Or spoken to.

Mark Bridge writes:

I’m not a big fan of reporting on rumours - I’d rather wait until the real thing happens - but I thought these two stories were too big and too well-defined to ignore completely.

Firstly, it looks as though Amazon will be announcing an Android-powered tablet tomorrow. Called the Kindle Fire, it probably won’t be a direct replacement for the Kindle e-book reader but an alternative. Most commentators suggest we should expect a 7-inch colour screen, a focus on cloud-based services and a pretty heavily customised version of Android.

Ian Kilpatrick, chairman of IP security specialists Wick Hill Group, writes:

Smartphones are spreading throughout the business world. Their use is growing across organisations and at all levels.

According to Gartner, sales of mobile devices in the second quarter of 2011 grew 16.5% year-on-year. Smartphone sales grew 74% year-on-year and accounted for 25% of overall sales in the second quarter of 2011, up from 17% in the second quarter of 2010.

Iain Graham, James Rosewell and Mark Bridge return to review their mobile industry predictions from last year. Which mergers, partnerships and developments did they forecast correctly... and which didn’t work out as planned?

Later in the programme, the team anticipates some of the topics that will be hitting the headlines during 2016.

Mark Bridge learns about the mobile technology trends at Mobile World Congress 2015 by chatting to James Rosewell of 51Degrees, Dr Kevin Curran from the IEEE and Chris Millington of Doro.

They talk about wearable devices, wireless charging, mobile operating systems and much more... including some of their favourite products from the exhibition.

We're taking a look back at the biggest mobile industry news stories from February 2015, including allegations that the UK's security service tried to breach SIM card security by hacking into one of the world's biggest SIM producers.

We also talk about the planned BT and EE merger, the creation of two new UK virtual networks, some acquisitions in the mobile payment arena and a new Ubuntu smartphone.

In today's programme Mark Bridge talks to Chris Millington, who's Managing Director for Doro UK and Ireland.

They discuss the state of mobile retailing in the UK, the future of wearable devices and - as you might expect - smartphones for seniors.

We're back with a month of mobile industry news, including takeover talks and takeover rumours. O2 and Three are said to be discussing a merger... but is there any truth in the suggestions that BlackBerry could be up for grabs?

We also discuss Apple's record-breaking quarterly figures, the highlights of CES and the launch of Microsoft Windows 10, as well as saying farewell to the current version of Google Glass.