West Midlands police said theft of phones had been cut by 50 per cent in the last 12 months … Cellnet business director Martin Stiven joined BT Mobile … a Lancashire entrepreneur tried to charge users 18 a year to Join the Organisation of Mobile Phone Users …

Virgin Atlantic marketing chief Chris Moss joined Hutchison to work on the launch of Orange … thieves stole 25000 worth of phones from Astec …

NEC confirmed a shortage of its P3 phone … Isto Pankakoski became MD of Nokia Mobile Phones.

Speaking at the opening day of the Associations 43rd Plenary meeting in Santiago Chile outgoing chairman Michael Stocks said that if current growth rates are sustained there should be between 700 million and one billion GSM customers world-wide by 2005.

This figure is predicted to rise to one person in 12 in the world having a GSM phone just over a year from now. At the end of March 2000 GSM boasted a total of 285 million subscribers. This was up by 125 million on the March 99 figure. It gives GSM a 55 per cent share of the worlds wireless market making it the worlds leading wireless system.

The figures confirm that a landmark 300 million GSM customer total will be reached in early May 2000. The phenomenal 77 per cent growth of GSM over the last year can be put in perspective when it is compared to the PC market which grew 22 percent in 1999 said Stocks.

This significant comparison illustrates the dramatic potential of high speed wireless data and internet access services in the next few years.

GSM has not only firmly established itself as todays dominant global wireless system with more customers than all other wireless standards combined but also as one of the worlds healthiest and fastest growing industries.

Customers will continue to benefit from the incredible volume value and variety of wireless services on offer. We are confidently predicting half a billion subscribers by mid-2001.

China is the largest single GSM market in the world. Market penetration is reaching 70 per cent in many GSM markets with Finland and Italy expecting to be the first countries to reach 100 per cent.

In the UK almost 400 million text messages were transmitted during the month. Similar traffic levels to the UK are reported for Italy and France.

The GSM Association now predicts that by December monthly traffic total is expected to reach an astonishing 10 billion messages a month.

Customer demand for SMS messaging is gaining momentum globally. In Australia current usage is running at a level of almost 30 million SMS messages a month. In North America more than 20 million messages are sent and received monthly. In South Africa traffic is currently running at approximately 15 million messages per month. German customers sent and received one billion messages in March.

Over two million are contract customers. The remaining 1.6 million are pre-pay customers. Orange says it has this year captured the largest share of the contract growth and says is now seeing strong growth in pre-pay following the launch of its new Just Talk package.

Orange growth is surging ahead in the run up to Christmas. The rate of new connections has doubled between October and November. By the end of the year market penetration will have reached 40 per cent well ahead of earlier predictions of 35 per cent. Next year will see the beginnings of huge growth in mobile data services including high speed data video telephony telemetry and telematics said Orange CEO Hans Snook.

By 2006 we believe that revenues from mobile data will overtake those of voice.

Orange says it has 25 per cent more base stations than its nearest competitor (ie Vodafone) and 75 per cent more than the weakest (ie One 2 One).

The campaign kicks off with a massive television blitz from this Friday (May 5).

There are three different commercials in the first burst which promotes the theme let the world come to you.

The network last week launched a series of teaser press and poster ads showing arrows and the copy line you are here.

The recipients mobile phone number becomes an e-mail address in the form mobilenumber@winbox.com. Sending this message automatically creates an e-mail box at Winbox.com.

There is no need to pre-register to the service.

The recipient will receive an SMS (short message) on their mobile telling them a message has arrived. They can access their e-mail box from any computer connected to the Internet or any telephone (fixed or mobile) and then use it themselves to exchange fax messages voice mails and e-mails.

This service is independent of the mobile operators so it can be used via any mobile phone. Apart from call charges when listening to voice messages Winbox.com services are accessible free of charge.

By dialling the Winbox.com phone line from a fixed or mobile phone users can listen to a digitised voice reading the incoming e-mail messages.

They can reply directly by recording a voice message that will be sent to their contacts electronic mailbox. Arrival of a new e-mail is done by automatic alert to their mobile phones. Message filtering is possible so that only messages meeting specific conditions are notified by SMS.

The new campaign is timed for the launch of BTCellnets pre-pay WAP phone and uses the copy line Surf the BTCellnet.

The campaign includes TV radio and posters building on the current mobile internet print and poster campaign. It runs over an initial three-month period.

The first Netman commercial is directed by Doug Foster who has directed campaigns for Guinness and Sony Mini Disc which blend digital and traditional filming techniques.

The Netman ad begins with a person logging onto the internet using a BTCellnet WAP mobile phone.

As the surfer connects the viewer enters a cyber world with Netman surfing the internet until he reaches his cyberspace destination.

This is the first time that a UK mobile operator has run a TV advertising campaign solely focusing on the mobile internet.

The campaign mentions a series of BTCellnet firsts in the mobile internet area including the launch of the first mobile ISP Genie Internet and the launch of the first working commercial WAP service in the UK in January 2000.

BTCellnet marketing director Peter Richardson said:

BTCellnet is the market leader in driving the development of the mobile internet. This pioneering campaign signals our ambition to stay out in front.

The 569 package boxes a Nokio 8210 and Psion Revo pocket organiser. The two devices link via infra-red to allow SMS e-mail and internet communications through the Revo. It is being sold by outlets such as The Carphone Warehouse and Phones 4U. A special limited edition run of 500 boxes contains 8210 phones with covers designed to appeal to City traders.