The services range from free itemised billing to software that contains a single report for all the mobile phones on one account.

These billing management products have been designed especially for our business customers. There is a package to suit every business no matter what their sizecommented Vodafone Retail managing director Ian Gray.

Vodafone Retails business advisors will recommend which billing management product will be most suitable by looking at companies individual requirements. Packages on offer allow customers to analyse how all their mobiles are being used both individually and collectively. Bills are received the way the customer wants them.

Vodafone Value Watch is for businesses that require sophisticated information about their monthly bills. Every month customers receive a CD-ROM that contains an electronic version of their monthly bill. Charts tables and graphics allows customers to segment and analyse their bill.

Vodafone Vision Plus provides small to medium-sized businesses with a paper-based report sent free of charge in addition to their standard bill. It contains information that shows usage and spend.

The UWCC is a Washington-based international consortium of more than 100 wireless carriers and vendors supporting the TDMA EDGE and WIN technology standards.

Both the UWCC and GSM Association share the common objective of providing seamless voice and high speed data solutions for subscribers around the world said GSM Association chief executive Robert Conway.

This joint effort enables global operators from our respective associations to focus on customer solutions through cooperative development efforts.

This development fits extremely well with the GSM Associations establishment of the GSM Global Roaming Forum which will enable global TDMA and GSM operators to develop full interoperability.

Umesh Amin chairman of the UWCC stated: Its time the carriers moved beyond the discussion of the various technical proposals at the ITU level and begin working on deployable global solutions.

The two organisations will work to resolve issues such as membership participation exchange of information and Intellectual Property Rights and technical development on roaming between TDMA and GSM systems.

TDMA network operators currently serve an estimated 65 million subscribers globally. UWCC members include: Alcatel AT&T BellSouth Cellular Corp Cable and Wireless Compaq Ericsson Hughes Network Systems Motorola Nokia and Nortel.

The GSM Association represents the interests of 405 GSM satellite and 3rd Generation network operators regulators and administrative bodies from 142 countries of the world. The Associations members provide digital GSM services to over 250 million customers globally.

By dialling 133 victims can directly summon assistance from their local police force. The improved system speeds up the emergency call process by directly connecting the user to the police force that issued the phone. There is no need to be directed through an operator.

Vodafone already has approximately 1300 phones in use under the Safelink programme through 15 police forces throughout the UK.

Examples of people who may benefit from the scheme include victims of domestic violence and witnesses in court cases.

Users are equipped with a Vodafone that only allows them to make 999 or 133 calls. By dialling 133 the caller is automatically routed to the police force that issued the Vodafone Safelink mobile. As each police force holds individual case histories the needs of the user are known and the action to be taken can be determined.

The Vodafone Safelink system is a lifeline between the user and their police force. Police forces can now offer those at risk with a secure and reliable means of communicating with them no matter where the user is commented Vodafone managing director Alan Harper.

From February 7 the first two minutes of calls to local national or other One 2 One numbers will be charged at 30p a minute.

The remaining 23 hours 58 minutes of calls each day will be charged at a flat rate of 5p a minute (excluding calls to other mobiles international calls or dialled premium numbers). In line with Oranges Just Talk initiative voucher expiry has been eliminated.

Existing customers with remaining credit on the Up 2 You standard tariff will make calls at the new rates and can now have the time limit on their credit removed.

The network also claims the new tariff means national weekday calling rates up to 85 per cent lower than on rival networks. Calls to other operators mobiles down by 60 per cent to 30p per minute are claimed to be 40 per cent cheaper than some other operators.

One 2 One managing director Tim Samples said:

We have always believed in providing our customers with great value for money and encouraging use of the service. This reduction in our standard pre-pay tariff will be a a major attraction for new pre-pay customers.

Unlike our competitors we dont intend to penalise our pre-pay customers if they want to make lots of peak calls.

We know if you price the service appropriately customers will make more calls. We still have the highest average revenue per pre-pay customer of any of the networks said Samples.

TTP will embed Cursor code into the first layer of handset software for all mobile phone manufacturers it supplies. It will be up to the manufacturer whether or not to to enable the location software or leave it dormant.

TTPCom believes that CPSs Cursor mobile location software will be one of the most important new technologies for mobile users in the coming years and we want to be the first supplier to make this technology available to the mobile community said TTP MD Tony Millbourn.

CPS and TTPCom have been working together since last year when it retro-fitted Cursor in Maxon handsets used for trials.Vodafone has already been trialling Cursor.

VIAG Interkom is a joint venture of VIAG AG British Telecom and Telenor. It plans to provide high-speed data email chat and information services for both contract and pre-paid customers.

GPRS offers instant packet-switched connections to data networks. In addition to allowing faster and easier internet access this continuous connectivity enables a variety of new applications such as multimedia messaging wireless corporate intranet and any number of monitoring or surveillance applications.

It does this by installing the browsing software in the SIM card rather than in the phones firmware as in WAP.

Virgin Mobile says it will be the first network in the world to offer internet browsing from all its phones.

The secret lies in a new generation of 32k SIM cards from Gemplus Giesecke & Devrient (G&D) Orga Kartensysteme and Schlumberger – who claim to supply around 80 per cent of the worlds SIM card-using mobile phone networks. Richard Williams head of advanced wireless technology at Virgin Mobile said:

By introducing SIM-based browsing we will enable all customers to get onto the internet when they want to wherever they want to. And they wont need to buy an expensive top-of-the-range phone first. This is silicon socialism at its finest.

However SIM-based browsing may not be the breakthrough that Williams hints at.

The idea of using SIM cards to implement WAP isnt new Telenor Mobil and Singapore Telecom deployed it towards the end of last year said Mobile News mobile internet columnist Matthew Haig.

Virgin is promoting their SIM based WAP as a true WAP service. Technically it is as the WAP standard does include the facility to use SMS as the bearer rather than a data channel. But people may not realise that what they are getting isnt the best possible performance and so cause something of a backlash against it. A poor initial experience may well stop them ever trying WAP again. SIM Toolkit based WAP has its place. But users must be made aware that they are getting a lower class of service Haig explained.

There are several differences between a WAP1.1 enabled phone such as the 7110 or Ericsson R320 and a SIM Toolkit capable phone running a SIM WAP application. The main one is that the SIM Toolkit version cant use a TCP/IP data connection. So the browsing has to be done using SMS. This is slow and may not happen in real time. It isnt that unusual to have a few minutes delay between sending an SMS and it being received. Having a lot of people trying to use the new Virgin WAP service may in itself cause delays.

SIM Toolkit WAP is better than no WAP. But is not as good as having a true WAP 1.1 compliant phone. Of course being able to access WAP content using a low-end Motorola rather than a high-end Nokia will bring in a whole new set of potential users though the relatively slow response times may well put them off buying a full-blown WAP enabled handset said Haig.