Mark Bridge writes:

The UK mobile phone industry knows all about subsidised prices. Independent mobile dealers and high-street shops will happily offer a ‘free phone with free connection’ in order to tie a customer into a minimum-term contract.

Nokia Corporation and Siemens AG have agreed that Nokia will buy Siemens’ 50% stake of the Nokia Siemens Networks joint venture for €1.7 billion (£1.5 billion).

The deal is expected to be completed during the third quarter of this year, subject to regulatory approval.

This week's Mobile Monday London event featured a panel discussion about the opportunities for mobile-based geolocation and mapping. The event was supported by UK mapping agency Ordnance Survey.

In this podcast you'll hear the first part of the evening's discussion plus interviews with Nokia's Gary Gale, who chaired the panel, and Ian Holt from Ordnance Survey. Part 2 is available as a separate podcast.

The Financial Times has reported that Nokia is expected to stop shipping Symbian smartphones this summer, although it doesn’t expect the company to make a formal announcement.

Nokia chose Microsoft’s Windows Phone OS as its main smartphone platform in 2011 but has committed to providing support for Symbian until 2016.

Mark Bridge writes:

Last year, the Google I/O developer conference gave us plenty of product announcements: Google Glass, the Nexus 7 tablet, the Nexus Q device and the Jelly Bean version of Android. This year’s announcements were less dramatic: a streaming music service, a Google-friendlier Galaxy S4 and some game development tools. Coincidentally (or perhaps not) Apple announced its 50 billionth app download in the middle of the event.