Staff Reporter

Vodafone is believed to have paid between 3 million to 4 million for Generation Telecom although neither company is officially revealing the amount.

Generation Telecom founded in 2001 was an O2 and Vodafone service provider with offices in High Wycombe Surbiton and York.

It had a customer base of 27000 subscribers of whom 85 per cent are on Vodafone.

Phones International boss Peter Jones is understood to have done the deal amid concerns it was becoming increasingly hard to compete with the networks and other service providers to retain its few large accounts which are mainly railway companies.

Vodafone would not elaborate on whether Generation Telecom would be integrated into Vodafones new business services division. A spokesperson simply said:

Its business as usual while we assess the business and the best way forward.

Former Generation Telecom managing director Keith Westcott is leaving the business to rejoin

Ericsson at the beginning of February as vice-president of wireless key accounts for Ericssons infrastructure business.

He will manage Ericssons relationships with UK operators. Vodafone director Ian Watson has taken over the reins at Generation Telecom in the interim.

Yes Telecom MD Keith Curran commented:

Generation Telecom was the last company I expected to sell out to Vodafone. Its difficult to tell whether Vodafone decided it wanted the business and made Phones International an offer it couldnt refuse. On the other hand it could have been that the business had not been performing to expectations.

He went on: I am surprised at the subscriber figures being quoted. We estimated that Generation Telecom had nearer 40000 to 50000 subscribers after acquiring customers from Global Crossing and Anglo Communications. Maybe they tell a story.

Your Communications director of mobile services Paul Lawton was more philosophical:

Six months ago I would have thought Generation Telecom was in it for the long run. The company probably found it much harder to grow the business to meet the ambitious nature of the group.

He was undismayed however: Its good to see a consolidated market. But I dont relish the thought of being one of the last SPs standing. Then again there could well be new entrants into the market. This could well be a changing of the guard rather than the end of service provision.

The Sony Ericsson camera phone phone went missing from the scene of the crash near Napier on the North Island of New Zealand.

Sherlock (33) was killed when the camper-van he was driving was struck side-on by a truck and trailer unit at an intersection with a motorway.

The phone was a silver and black Sony Ericsson camera phone which contained photographs of the family on their New Zealand holiday A reward has been offered for its return.

His wife Vicky and their nine-year-old daughter and three-year-old son escaped with minor injuries.

According to reports Martin Treacey a close friend of the Sherlock family said the phone had gone missing following the accident and may have been thrown out the window of the camper-van in the crash.

The phone was switched on after the accident as someone rang it but the call was not answered.

Subsequent calls by the family to the phone have been unable to make contact.

Police believe the camper-van may have followed a truck into an intersection before another truck slammed into it.

The first games available will be Rally (a four-player game) and RC Battle (for eight contestants). Once downloaded the games can be played on a wide variety of Sony Ericsson handsets.

The games are currently being evaluated by a small number of invited participants but following positive feedback from them the indications are that the manufacturer will open up the trial to all-comers in early February.

Virgin Mobile is to start recruiting independent dealers for the first time and will be looking to expand the brand into Europe.

These are the initial consequences of Virgin Mobiles out-of-court settlement with T-Mobile the other partner in the joint-venture. The Virgin Group now obtains 100 per cent control of Virgin Mobile while T-Mobile has settled for a non-exclusive 10-year supplier agreement

It really has liberated the opportunities of the business said Virgin Mobile chief executive Tom Alexander.

Were going to be expanding distribution and the proposition we can offer. Weve got clear access to 2.5G access going forward. Weve a good relationship with T-Mobile and a long-term contract.

He would not be drawn as to whether Virgin would look to sever the relationship with T-Mobile entirely saying: There might be no need to go elsewhere but having the complete flexibility is a benefit.

According to Alexander the end of the acrimonious court case has been cause for celebration and will allow the company to better address present market conditions.

We definitely opened a few bottles of champagne. I cant talk about the details as were bound by loads of confidentiality clauses. It has taken lots of discussion. We wanted to get it absolutely right. We dont want to end up fighting again he said.

We had both been living with an unsatisfactory contract that we had to battle out in court. We wanted to put a contact together that was black and white with no areas of disagreement.

Alexander claims it has taken a Virgin Mobile team a full year to work out a new contract to take into account mobile developments.

The original contact was written in 1998 so the details of technologies like 3G were still vague and hazy he said. Now a lot more is known. Both sides could put down a lot of hard details.

According to Alexander the arrival of new T-Mobile MD Brian McBride was a big help.

It helped the process that he came in and had a totally different approach and was able to sit down and talk constructively. A lot of progress was made with a good spirit of co-operation.

McBride said: It is a good deal for both companies. This deal was not just between myself and Virgin. It had to be approved at very high level within T-Mobile. In its previous state there was no way of unlocking the value in Virgin Mobile. A week ago Virgin Mobile was not worth anything. Now the company is free to float and the commercial terms are better for both companies.

If Virgin Mobile floats for more than 550 million we get a share of that. We have a significantly better relationship with Virgin now. I dont accept that Virgin will be worse off under the new agreement.

He conceded that there was no way for either party to exit the joint-venture except by going to court.

The old contract was a probably a good one at the time it was signed five years ago. However the market has changed. This is a reflection of that. The old arrangement was primarily a voice-only deal. It didnt lay out the way that Virgin would be able to access new data services. MMS GPRS and 3G werent even around then.

McBride said the new supply contract clearly spelled out how services would be provided to Virgin and he claimed he was not not worried if Virgin decided to use a new supplier.

Virgins most complex relationship is with its network supplier. It would be a huge risk and challenge to try and work with multiple suppliers or even change suppliers said McBride. I cant see why Virgin would want to change network suppliers and its not our intention to want to cause Virgin to find another supplier. The commercial terms are good for both companies. Virgin is happy with network performance. We want to have Virgin Mobile customers using our network. However it wont ruin T-Mobile if Virgin decides to change network supplier.

If Virgin is successful we share the upside of that growth. There was always going to be a conflict of interests being a supplier and a joint-venture partner. In any joint-venture peoples businesses and their interests change over time.

I intended to resolve the situation when I joined in June last year. It was clear from the outset that the best way forward was a sale of our share of the joint-venture. However it didnt come together until late last year. (See analysis P10)

The cumulative number of page impressions for 2003 stands at 8.2 billion surpassing the associations prediction of eight billion impressions for the whole of the year.

The 60000 sq ft building complete with gym and subsidised cafe will also house personnel responsible for the outsourced aftersales care of some Vodafone and O2 customers. Opal Telecom formerly based at Irlham in Greater Manchester will also relocate to the Warrington site.

The current workforce of 85 will increase to 265 by July 2004.

With a recommended retail price of 99.99 on pay-as-you-go the One Touch 735 has a camera and is MMS-capable with polyphonic ringtones and downloadable games. It offers one-touch access to integrated Orange services.

Other television feeds have been available for some time notably Bloombergs 24-hour news service. However this content is downloaded in the form of recorded clips – it is not live television.

The joint-venture between Channel 4 the shows producers Endemol and mobile video hosting company Vemotion represents a milestone according to Vemotion CEO Tony Antoniou.

I believe the user experience offered by our high-quality live video delivered over GPRS networks is better than any medium currently viable on any mobile phones on any network Antoniou told Mobile News.

Though Shattered is likely to have been watched on mobile by just a handful of keen viewers Antoniou is convinced this is just the start.

Plans are well advanced to make all Endemols output for Channel 4 (including Big Brother) available over GPRS networks.

Vemotions platform is scalable and according to Antoniou able to cope with simultaneous demand from millions of phone viewers. An additional server farm in Germany will cater for viewers in mainland Europe.

Though not all 2.5G handsets are currently able to receive the live video feed based on the latest international standard H.264 the Nokia N-Gage 7650 6600 and 3650 the Sony Ericsson P900 O2 xda and HP iPAQ are compatible. Other handset models are being added to the list.

The service is currently accessed via reverse-billed SMS for a one-off charge of 1 after which normal network GPRS rates apply.

Darren Oxlade 26 of Bletchingley Surrey is charged with unlawfully and maliciously wounding 40-year-old Tony OConnell with intent to do grievous bodily harm at his flat in Marylebone London on December 16 2003.

He is additionally charged with unlawfully entering the flat as a trespasser.

It is alleged that Oxlade attacked OConnell with a wine bottle leaving him with head wounds requiring 30 stitches.

Magistrates who transferred the case to Middlesex Guildhall Crown Court rejected Oxlades application for bail.

Check out www.mobilenewsawards.co.uk or e-mail queries to Lucy Glennon lucyg@mobilenewscwp.co.uk.