Three mobile telecom organisations have been hailed as some of the UKs 100 nicest companies to work for according to The Sunday Times.

They are The Carphone Warehouse Virgin Mobile and Isis Telecom.

The Carphone Warehouse came fourth in the list of the 100 Best Big Companies to work for.

Virgin Mobile came in at 72nd place in the Big Company list.

West London-based service provider Isis Telecommunications earned itself 18th place in the 100 Best Small Companies list. Isis made headlines in Mobile News a year ago when its employee James Storey won 100000 in Data Selects Who Wants to be a Millionaire promotion. His prize money was shared among the Isis team.

130000 UK employees were quizzed about their workplace. Their opinions were then collated to see which companies provide a supportive environment in which staff feel rewarded appreciated and are encouraged to develop.

Carphone Warehouse UK chief executive Andrew Harrison said he was delighted with the companys high placing.

Careers thrive at The Carphone Warehouse. We invest in the best people to deliver the best service. What is so rewarding is that this honour comes as the result of direct feedback from our people.

Harrison added that CPWs 7000 employees get standard benefits including life insurance an income protection scheme and a stakeholder pension scheme.

The retailer also offers an employee incentive scheme whereby sales consultants can earn themselves anything from high street gift vouchers to trips to Australia and The Maldives.

Virgin Mobile CEO Tom Alexander said it was a great accolade.

This is an outstanding achievement for Virgin Mobile he said. We are delighted to gain third best company to work for in the South West in the prestigious Sunday Times 100 Best Companies list for the first time.

Whats more previously we have been placed in the Top 50 Best Workplaces list in the Financial Times for two years running. This is further evidence that Virgin Mobile is a remarkable and exceptional company.

Isis was equally delighted with its placing.

HR manager Emma Leach told Mobile News that the company has 62 permanent staff with a retention rate of 97 per cent.

We place a great deal of emphasis on employee wellbeing through training and development social events and an enjoyable working environment.

Its as important to us that our employees are happy in their work as it is that we offer excellent service to our clients.

The two are mutual – if our employees are happy our clients are happy and vice versa.

Being listed so highly in the Best Companies list has proved testament to this she said.

At the UK launch of the SK65 handset this week Siemens vice-president for Northern Europe Jonathan Bate said:

Our former CEO said we have the option to fix it sell it or to close the business down. Because of that everyone had guessed that we are going to close down the mobile division or merge it with another manufacturer.

But it has also been said that we are going to fix this business. Were not looking to sell or merge with another manufacturer.

Siemens said an internal fix of its mobile division was under way. The programme has been dubbed Energise MD and will rectify the problem of products coming late to market that damaged Siemens Mobile in the second half of last year.

Its all about time to market making sure weve got the right customer relationships and that were doing the right marketing things said Bate.

We are now putting things in place so that the new products are on time. Siemens is in the mobile phone business for the long term.

Weve had two bad quarters because our products were late to market. There were software issues and weve paid the price. But thats history. Were here to stay.

Henning Dransfelt a research director at telecoms analysts Ovum commented:

It was very surprising that Siemens didnt announce anything at its AGM on January 27. It could be buying time. Or maybe a deal fell through at the last minute. [New CEO] Klaus Kleinfeld did say the mobile unit was losing e1 million a day and had lost e143 million in the quarter. He made strong noises that it would be sold or shut effectively ruling out an internal fix.

At its AGM on January 27 von Pierer told shareholders they would have to wait for a decision despite the need for a quick action.

Siemens has confirmed that it will release 15 new products in 2005. These include the new SK65 BlackBerry handset and two 3G phones.

According to Bate this is a clear indication of Siemens optimism for mobile in the future.

Its the widest range weve launched to date. It demonstrates Siemens commitment to the market he declared.

He went on to accept that while the manufacturer was keen to have a presence in all areas of the market it needed to maintain focus.

We need to be in all the key segments but focused within them he said.

Weve focused too much on the low-end in the past which has given us great volume but not the profits that are needed.

Key to Siemens strategy was its approach to 3G.

Well have a clamshell 3G device and a bar phone-style handset revealed Bate.

With the exception of 3 the operators are in the early stages of launch. We want to come in when its mass market. The 2.5G market is still massive and there are some exceptionally good products out there already.

The SK65 ships next week having been delayed from November. It is pitched at business users and supports voice diary e-mail and Bluetooth connectivity and has a full QWERTY keyboard and BlackBerry capability.

In a statement the network said:

A number of the support functions of Singlepoint and Vodafone have now been aligned with many employees reskilling or transferring to other positions.

The final integration project will be completed by April 2005 and it is anticipated that 195 roles will be put at risk of redundancy.

It is hoped that some redeployment will be possible at Singlepoint as well as in other parts of the Vodafone business.

When Vodafone acquired Singlepoint it made no secret of the fact that the company would become part of the Vodafone UK business.

Vodafone also recognised that Singlepoint had consumer telesalesexpertise and it developed Singlepoint as a telesales centre of excellence.

Over the past 10 months this has been developed as a telesales centre for all Vodafone consumer customers as well as a new direct sales service.

Call handlers are now also sharing customer calls with Vodafones other contact centres in Birmingham and Warrington resulting in a culling of many jobs now that the two businesses have been integrated.

A source close to Orange revealed: Oranges dealer roadmap for 2005 has 3G pencilled in for early February. Knowing Orange it is a loose date. It could be March.

Its just looking to dip its toe in the water at the moment and plans to spend 12 million which isnt much to acquire between one and 1.5 million customers this year.

According to the source the Sony Ericsson Z1010 is already on the roadmap as well as around three other models.

It will be a soft launch. It wont be big because it cant afford to get into a fight with the other 3G networks. None of them has mastered the technology yet and it will hurt Orange financially if it allows customers to migrate too quickly between its networks.

The source added that Orange will allow customers to upgrade between its 2.5G and 3G networks.

Orange said that no plans had been finalised with regard to the independent dealer channel.

It hasnt been nailed down yet said a spokesman. Its in the process of being confirmed. Nothing has been finalised. People will be talking about it because we launched our 3G services at the end of last year.

He leaves at the end of this month and will be replaced by business solutions vice-president Mike Newnham who joined Orange four years ago from PriceWaterhouseCoopers as vice-president of finance.

Alastair MacLeod formerly sales director of business solutions will assume Newnhams former position as vice-president of business solutions at Orange UK on an interim basis.

The six-year deal Sony Ericssons first global sponsorship is said to be the largest and most comprehensive sponsorship in the history of tennis and of womens professional sport.

It will see Sony Ericsson becoming the global title sponsor of the tour which is being renamed the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour. This includes the end-of-season globally televised WTA Tour Championships which are held each November and feature the worlds top eight singles players and top doubles teams.

Sony Ericsson will also enjoy a significant on-court presence at the many WTA Tour tournaments throughout the season with hundreds of matches televised in every region of the world.

Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications president Miles Flint said:

Together with the WTA Tour we are exploring a range of opportunities that can integrate technology design music sport and fashion into a compelling entertainment proposition for consumers.

Meanwhile Vodafone has announced the extension of its Ferrari Formula One team sponsorship for a further two years.

According to Vodafone chief marketing officer Peter Bamford the agreement will continue to involve branding on both the cars and on the helmets of drivers and the overalls of pit crews.

We are very happy to continue our partnership with Ferrari he added.

The Formula One sponsorship has greatly enhanced our global brand profile and will enable us to continue to build Vodafone as one of the worlds leading brands.

He concluded: We are looking forward to generating greater affinity for the Vodafone brand and our products and services with our customers.

That was the claim of Hutchison Whampoa chairman Canning Fok in Hong Kong last week.

He also revealed that 3s global customer base rose from 6.7 million subscribers at the end of 2004 to 6.764 million by January 4 doubling its total customer base by adding 3.5 million in just over four months.

According to Dixons we had the industry-leading contract handset in the LG 8120 and the best-selling pre-pay handset in the NEC e616 claimed a 3 spokesperson. So we dominated sales on pre-pay and contract over the Christmas period which shows it was a 3G Christmas after all.

Of 3s competitors Vodafone has not yet released figures for the period. O2 and Virgin Mobile said they were unable to comment because the period is tied to their financial reporting cycles. Other networks declined to comment.

Daniel Whyte 38 of Bronte House Kilburn and Owen Foster 37 of no fixed abode were remanded in custody at Horseferry Road Magistrates Court for trial at the Middlesex Guildhall Crown Court.

They are charged with stealing a Nokia mobile phone and 10 cash from Jason Siret using force on January 3 outside the Costcutters shop on Harrow Road Paddington.

Foster is also charged with illegal possession of cannabis at the same time and place.

As of today (January 14) new legislation known as the Insurance Mediation Directive (IMD) regulates the sale of insurance policies.

No company can now sell insurance or recommend or refer clients to insurance providers unless that company is fully registered with the Financial Services Authority (FSA).

As a result O2 has dropped its O2 Insure policy from the independent dealer channel. It told its resellers: To comply with these new regulations we are no longer able to offer the O2 Insure product to Pay Monthly or Pay & Go customers through our independent sales channels.

Dealers were told to cease all O2 Insure selling activity and destroy all O2 Insure sales leaflets product registration forms and terms and conditions they may be holding.

O2 will no longer pay commission for any sales made after this week.

The legislation will also affect traders who may find that their goods in transit are not covered unless the policy was correctly purchased. Previously a call to a freight-forwarder and payment of an appropriate premium was all it took to insure a pallet-load of phones or crate of computer chips from its arrival in a warehouse to its ultimate destination.

Under the IMD however traders must use an authorised broker to arrange cover unless they are dealing with one of the very few freight-forwarders that have registered as an appointed introducer or representative for a regulated insurance provider.

Because of the additional administrative burden they face by doing so many freight-forwarders who currently sell insurance as a secondary activity have not applied for regulation.

The British International Freight Association (BIFA) estimates that that less than one per cent of its 1300 members will in fact register.

BIFA director general Colin Beaumont commented:

We fought to obtain exemption for freight-forwarders from the Insurance Mediation Directive but exemption has not been granted despite the negative impact that the legislation will have on UK trade.

According to Beaumont this includes substantial premium increases for exporters unfair competition with other EU member states who are not imposing this legislation on their freight-forwarding sector and the risk of more goods being transported without any transit insurance cover.

It is a complete nonsense when new legislation brought in to protect the insurance consumer has the opposite effect he said.

Alan Lee of mobile phone insurance company Fonesure added:

Within the mobile phone industry there are many insurance providers who are not ready to continue trading from today so many insurance companies will be falling to the sidelines in our industry.

David Riley director of Cheshire-based Insurance Brokers Abbott and Bramwell said this week that he had received scores of e-mails from shippers and traders who had only just realised the situation they would find themselves in.

Many traders have not heard about the new legislation and some of those that have dont realise the implications said Riley.

There are going to be a lot of uninsured goods travelling in white vans up and down the countrys motorway network thats for sure.

Traders may presume that they are covered. But if and when the worst happens they may well find they are not. Or at the very least that any claim they make is disputed.

He warned that traders may be exposed even when their consignments are in the forwarders warehouse waiting for onward shipment unless they arrange insurance themselves.

The IMD is going to affect the way we work as a company added Riley.

Whereas Abbott and Bramwell had previously has blanket policies with forwarders Riley said the company was now being forced to enter into hundreds of agreements with individual traders to cover the same risk.

Whether theyre looking for cover for an individual consignment or an annual policy the bottom line is that traders will have to source that cover from a regulated provider he said.

Theyll have to get their hands dirty or live with the fact that their goods will not be insured.