NTT DOCOMO, Renesas Electronics, Fujitsu, NEC, Panasonic and Sharp have announced an agreement that'll see them working together to develop a new application platform for mobile phones. The new platform, which promises improved processing speeds for high-quality video and 3D graphics, is intended to cut development time and costs for the four Japanese mobile phone manufacturers.

The new platform will be compatible with both the Symbian and Linux operating systems, while Android compatibility hasn't been ruled out. Mobile phones incorporating the new platform are expected to be seen in late 2011 or early 2012.

Virgin Media says the number of customers choosing 'pay monthly' contracts has increased by over 40% in the last 12 months – and it now has one million mobile contract customers.

Graeme Oxby, Virgin Media's executive director of mobile and home phone, said "We’re delighted to have reached the one million milestone as we continue to build on our unique ‘quad-play’ line-up of mobile, broadband, TV and home phone."

Yahoo! and Samsung have announced an expansion of their global partnership, which was launched in 2007. Samsung will install Yahoo! services - including Yahoo! Mail, Messenger, Search, Contacts, Calendar, News and Flickr - on millions of its mobile devices. Phones may come pre-loaded with one or more Yahoo! branded services.

The Carphone Warehouse has published its financial results for its fourth quarter of 2010, along with some figures for the full year and guidance for 2011.

It says its share of Best Buy Europe's net income to March 2010 was worth around £47 million, slightly more than had been predicted. In addition, its share of Best Buy Mobile US profit was around £46m, well ahead of initial guidance.