Staff Reporter

Franklyn Azolukwam (21) of Gascony Avenue Kilburn is charged with using criminal deception in an attempt to obtain a Nokia camera phone T-Mobile top-up card Gameboy and two Nokia 7210 phones from Argos on the Edgware Road using credit cards and other documents in the name of Bashir Ahmed.

He is further charged with giving false information on an Argos credit agreement.

The 240 MPx200 comes in a black clamshell design and carries many of the features first seen in the Orange SPV.

Like the SPV the MPx200 allows users to synchronise e-mail appointments and contacts with Microsoft Outlook through a PC connection as well as to browse the web and download music and videos.

There is no Bluetooth nor an integrated camera phone although an attachable camera can be fitted. The decision to exclude an integrated camera was taken because the handset was being aimed at the professional consumer market.

Motorola claimed its research had shown that a camera wasnt wanted in this segment. Bluetooth was desirable but it was omitted in an effort to keep the price down.

The phone is tri-band and also features an expandable 1Gb memory card and a number of embedded games. It will be sold through independent dealers but a date for distribution has not yet been announced.

Orange also last week launched its first handset to use the Palm operating system.

The Treo 600 has a colour touchscreen e-mail and Word and Excel functionality as well as an integrated camera.

It also offers standard Orange applications such as back-up and update. It will be available in October.

Futurenet Communications MD Jeremy Harris alleges Mainline edited out comments he posted on the Mainline bulletin board. Harris hopes his action will encourage dealers to share information about all the distributors and networks on the forum.

The forum will allow independent dealers to share tips and find out which distributor is offering the best packages he said.

O2 was the biggest creditor losing 1155760 in total. Orange was hit for 403451. Vodafone has written off 344843 and 4U is down 104607.

A number of other main trade creditors were owed more than 10000 each including Unique Distribution ( 43216) Ora ( 19085) and Pama ( 14067).

A report from joint administrators Ernst & Young shows that Convergent went bust when it was unable to raise 2 million to continue trading.

In a statement Ernst & Young said Convergent ran into severe financial difficulties because of general overcapacity and declining margins lower-than-forecast return from acquisitions significant bad debt write-offs and restructuring costs.

Retired Convergent founder John Weatherill said its woes began when it paid too much for the companies it bought and wrote that money off sometimes within months.

In June Weatherill who spent 1 million trying to prop up the firms share price blamed ex-managing director Tony Farmer for the debacle saying:

The management of Convergent turned 16 million into an 11 million overdraft in a little over two years. Its staggering.

Weatherill started the company in 1983 as John Weatherill Electronics.

The wind-up has so far cost 60807 in legal fees and 105179 in administrators costs.

Ernst & Young said there was little prospect of unsecured creditors seeing any dividend.

The first incident occurred in Amsterdam in August after a woman dropped her mobile.

The unidentified handset burst into flames as she picked it up and tried to switch it back on again causing serious burns to her face. It is believed the handset contained a non-Nokia battery.

In a second incident two weeks ago a Nokia 7210 burst into flames while it was in a teenage boys pocket. It is not clear whether this handset also utilised a third-party battery or not.

Nevertheless the Finnish manufacturer is fairly confident the faults were caused by third-party batteries and not through any fault of the handsets themselves.

Nokias UK representatives have been quick to reassure the public that there is no safety risk posed by its phones as long as the handset is used with approved accessories.

Nokia business development manager Ray Haddow said:

There is no cause for alarm. We are only aware of the first incident. It appears to be an isolated case.

The information indicates a non-original battery was fitted but we cant verify that yet. Consumers can feel safe as long as they use an original battery and original accessories. We are not aware of any similar incidents occurring in the UK.

Haddow said Nokia had not been able to recover the handset and analyse the battery.

We hope to do this to see how the incident happened and check the origin of the battery he added.

There have been similar cases to this involving our handsets but these are due to non-original batteries being fitted. We recommend our resellers offer original components as they are designed to work specifically with our products. We cant guarantee the quality of non-original products.

The figure from GSM Network operators O2 Orange T-Mobile and Vodafone takes the daily average to 29 million compared with 26 million per day in June.

WAP figures are seeing a continued increase due to high consumer interest in mobile games downloads and ringtones said the MDA. We predicted earlier this month that sales of ringtones would reach 70 million in 2003 an increase of 60 per cent on 2002.

The MDA expects WAP page impressions to reach eight billion by the end of the year. Julys figure currently provides a cumulative total for 2003 of more than 4.5 billion.

Six to eight million mobile-phone users have downloaded a ringtone. That still leaves around 42 million users who havent said MDA chairman Mike Short.

This means 3 customers will also be able to make and receive video calls while roaming abroad on 3 as well as making video calls from the UK to 3s overseas customers.

3 has also signed a deal with Japanese 3G operator NTT DoCoMo. This will allow 3 customers to make and receive video calls to NTT DoCoMo 3G customers in Japan.

However 3 customers will not be able to roam in Japan as the Japanese 3G network is incompatible with European specification 3G handsets.

International video calls originating in the UK will cost 1.50 per minute. Roaming video calls in Australia Austria Italy and Sweden will cost 30p per minute to receive and 1.20 to make.

Receiving a video call in Hong Kong will cost 50p per minute and making one will cost 1.20.

A 3 spokesperson said the network had been ready for some months but had not been activated for customers until pricing could be set.

Launching the festive ranges Virgin Mobile sales director Graeme Hutchinson said:

We have the cheapest camera phone in the UK on pre-pay with the Sony Ericsson T230 at 99.99 and the smallest colour phone in the UK the Panasonic G50 at 120. It will be interesting to see how the other networks react.

Virgin Mobiles festive range is heavy on colour with every new phone possessing a colour screen.

Handsets exclusive to Virgin Mobile include two Alcatel models the 332 ( 70) and 735 ( 150) and the Panasonic G50. The network also has the Sendo M550 ( 100) in an exclusive design and an exclusive silver finish Samsung e400.

Other handsets added to the range include the Samsung C100 ( 100) the Samsung E700 (around 300) Sony Ericsson T610 (around 200) and Sony Ericsson T230 ( 100 including add-on camera).

Virgin Mobile will also include a free handsfree earpiece with every phone it sells.

Free voicemail sports text alerts and itemised bills are also being thrown in. Texts to other Virgin Mobile customers are still being kept at 3p a minute.

There are now 21 handsets on offer from the virtual network.

(See White Lines P48).

At Cable & Wireless Royle ran the small business marketing team. He will be looking after Orange Business Standards – the small business offering that was launched last month by the network.

Royle has over 10 years experience in various marketing commercial and alliance roles within the IT and telecoms industry specialising in the business-to-business sector.

Before Cable & Wireless he worked for both Dell and Toshiba in commercial and marketing roles.

Research by the Finnish giant has found that 39 per cent of businesses in Europe intend to provide their mobile workers with e-mail access over the next 18 months.

In addition 19 per cent of businesses surveyed said they would be providing access to company databases and intranets from mobile phones. This represents a growth of over 200 per cent.

According to the survey the sectors that will see the biggest gains in usage are distribution utilities real estate and manufacturing.