Mark Bridge writes:

Patents were a very popular topic of conversation last week. Google sold its Motorola Mobility smartphone business to Lenovo but hung on to most of the patents. Does this mean the patents were the most valuable part of the business? Well, when you look at the difference between the original purchase price and the sale price, it seems a reasonable conclusion.

Inq Mobile, a Hutchison Whampoa subsidiary that launched in 2007 as a mobile phone manufacturer and produced one of the first so-called ‘Facebook phones’ before changing its focus to mobile software, has closed down.

Last year it produced a personalised magazine application called Material and a ‘social homescreen’ app called SO.HO.

Mark Bridge writes:

As the final days before this year’s Mobile World Congress approach, we discover there are two types of scheduled news announcements from the wireless telecoms industry.

There are the announcements delayed until MWC begins because the company wants to be part of the buzz at Barcelona. And there are the announcements made in the fortnight beforehand because they don’t want their story to get lost.

Inq, the Hutchison Whampoa subsidiary that started life five years ago as a mobile phone manufacturer before changing its focus to mobile software, has released the beta version of its new Material application.

Material is described as a ‘content discovery service’ that creates a twice-daily electronic magazine from information from the user’s Twitter and Facebook feeds.

Frank Meehan is stepping down from his role as CEO of Hutchison Whampoa-owned INQ Mobile.

He’ll now be working with other technology businesses owned by Li Ka-shing, the chairman of Hutchison Whampoa. Mr Meehan is on the board of Spotify, TOM, TOUT and Trapit.

Mark Windle, head of marketing at OpenCloud, predicts that this year’s reduction in the number of traditional telecoms operators in some countries will provide an opportunity for other operators to innovate and capture market share in 2016.

He says next year will be a year of rapid change for telecoms… whether it’s MVNO disruption, competitive tariff pricing or simply defence from the ‘dark art’ of hacking.

Mark Bridge writes:

The most memorable moments in life often go unrecorded. You don't have your camera in your hands. Your finger is still hovering over the 'pause' button on your audio recorder. Or you were simply too busy experiencing whatever was happening. It's all about the one that got away.

That's where Kapture can help.

Mark Bridge writes:

James Rosewell shows me a colourful roll of paper that's the width of an iPhone but well over three metres long. When I look closer, I can see it's a printed copy of the Wall Street Journal's mobile website. That's a lot of scrolling to do... and a pretty unfriendly user experience for anyone reading the news online. Why does it work so badly?

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.