3 hopes the handset will meet consumer expectations of a fair-sized mobile phone. It is expected to retail for 50 on a 3 contract but will not become available on ThreePay until the summer.

Its appearance is really impressive said John Hilli of Airdrie dealer Allsorts Communications.

Lee Edwards of The Phone Inn in Gravesend Kent added: A lot of potential 3 customers are looking for a smaller handset. This will fill that gap. It should be good for 3 because the size is better. A lot of people are put off 3 because the handsets are so large.

Dealers who have seen the LG8110 have said it looks like the

Samsung V200.

Its a very slightly different shape to the Samsung but it has the same dimensions and weight said Hilli.

I cant comment on user interface and usability because I didnt get the chance to have a play with it he said. But the tariffs are good on 3 and even if the interface is not great it will sell.

Jonny Marris of Mobiles in Hemel Hempstead said:

The interface is OK. It not as good as the Motorola V500 or the V600 but they are 2.5G phones. It is better than the NEC handsets but it doesnt have Bluetooth which could be a problem.

3 distributors already have the LG8110 in stock. It was delivered to larger retailers last weekend and will trickle down the channel this week.

Guinea pigs include Renault BAE Systems BT and the West Midlands Police Force. It is currently available as a free service on a two-month trial period with an xda 2 or a laptop with an O2 datacard.

Mainline will focus its recruitment drive on its sales team. There are also vacancies in Mainlines administration department and in credit control.

A total of seven jobs are waiting to be filled including the post of account manager which has just been vacated by Jonathan Ricketts.

Ricketts has tendered his resignation said Mainline managing director Andrew Boden. Its a private matter and I dont want to say too much more.

He went on: There are seven vacancies at Mainline at present. Some of them are newly created some of them arent. But only one account manager is moving on. The number of staff at Mainline at the end of the year will be higher than it was at the start.

The word on the industry grapevine was that Ricketts resignation came about because of frustrations with Oranges treatment of its distributors and dealers.

Thats not the reason said Boden. There are no problems with Orange. We are one of only two distributors that are part-owned by Orange and we have a good and profitable business with the network.

There were no sour grapes following his announcement. It is sad to see Jonathan go. He worked here for a long time. But there is nothing dramatic about his resignation.

Were a small company said Boden. We have only 60 staff. As new people start old staff leave. Thats the way it works. If anything we are expanding. We are planning to double the size of our sales team. There is a lot of work to do.

The figure was achieved in two months as distribution agreements were put in place with leading top-up providers e-pay PayPoint Omega Logic/Eposs and Alphyra.

The pre-pay vouchers are now everywhere that our customers would expect to find them said 3 sales director Marc Allera.

We now have top-up points in the same places that the other networks have them. It is important for us to sit alongside the other networks who have been around for a long time to show that we are a new and strong company.

Mobile retailers selling ThreePay top-up vouchers include Phones 4U and The Carphone Warehouse while high street stores include the Post Office and Esso and BP service stations.

Some customers are attracted by the aggressive offers that we produce. Others come to us because they want to download Premiership goals on a Saturday afternoon said Allera. What we can say is that the level of usage and revenue that we are getting from our content services is high.

Intels new chip is said to be the first to integrate multimedia MMX technology.

The device one of the PXA27x family has Intel Wireless MMX technology built in to facilitate handling music videos and photographs in one chip. The chips will also handle WiFi 3G and Wimax wireless broadband technology.

We need to deal with this problem now before it destroys our infrastructure. We dont want to hype this problem but we do need to be careful he said.

He added that spam was a growing problem for the industry. Brightmail estimates that 60 per cent of Internet e-mail is made up of bulk messages and that spammers have the ability to send 40 million messages to mobile handsets per hour.

Laws to block spammers and limit the number of unsolicited messages that can be sent by a single source have failed to stem the tide. According to Salem it is easy for spammers to hide their identity and operate despite the new restrictions.

With the commercial availability of 3G mobile broadband expected at the end of 2004 and the high volume of data that can be sent between handsets spam could affect the mobile network in the same way as the Internet.

With the lessons of the Internet in mind said Salem it is important for the industry to tackle the problem right away.

With the initial e-mail infrastructure we werent thinking about spam. We werent thinking about security or identity theft. We need to let the work being done in the fixed world help us in the mobile world.

BT says the service will spare customers the inconvenience and time spent in recovering valuable personal contact data if a handset is lost damaged or stolen and will therefore preserve call volumes and revenue for operators.

It uses SyncML a universal synchronisation protocol used by most handheld device makers.

The Mobile Directory Back-up service enables mobile users to set up and maintain their private directory details on the portal and then to wirelessly synchronise the contents of their mobile phonebook using their handset.

BT Wholesale Markets managing director Stuart Horwood said the service would be the first in a series of personal directory applications and services.

The new man running Tomo is Bill Simpson a director with Tomos parent company Interactive Telecoms Solutions.

Tomo last month opened its second branch in the Scottish new town of East Kilbride to augment its first shop in Nottingham.

We wish Bryan every success in his new post. He has done a great deal to take a new concept in retailing to its current level said Emanuel.

The board of ITS will provide support and direction for the continuing development of the business and its strategy.

Karan Bhatia (18) of Beeches Road Tooting Bec London is accused of stealing the phones on November 30 last year while working at The Carphone Warehouse store in Oxford Street London.

He has been remanded on unconditional bail for trial at Middlesex Guildhall Crown Court and will appear for a preliminary hearing at the Crown Court on April 12.

The merger had been expected as the companies are near each other in South Yorkshire and have worked together in the mobile industry for more than 20 years.

The new company would not reveal the precise financial details of the transaction.

Motek specialises in private mobile radio while GB Communications sells mobile phones and tracking devices.

GB and Motek work in similar fields. Over the years they have had a mutually beneficial relationship said a ninehundred communications spokesperson. Both firms have loyal staff. So it made sense to become a one-stop shop. Two heads are better than one.

Managing director Robert Rees who was formerly MD of GB Communications added:

Our name has changed but the faces products and services are still the same.