Before Euro Cellular Karavadra worked in a marketing role at Elite Accessories.

Mobile industry experts were not surprised by last weeks announcement that 106 Dixons stores will close.

The managing director of a leading rival retailer who declined to be named said:

The news wont be a surprise to anyone. Its been rumoured for some time that the whole estate is in trouble. But its disappointing to see someone of that stature closing stores.

Mobile Newss chief mystery shopper regularly found the stores to be under-performing on his visits. He said the closures were no loss to the mobile industry.

Dixons has never contributed anything meaningful to mobile phone retail he said.

The stores will not be sadly missed. The majority of the stores I have visited have fallen well below the minimum acceptable standards as far as their sales staff and approach to selling mobile phones is concerned.

He went on: On every occasion Ive found that its sales people are far more enthusiastic when it comes to selling plasma screens and Game Boys.

Dixons head of PR Hamish Thompson said the closures represented around two per cent of the groups trading space and the move had come about as part of a review on how best to develop the Dixons format for the future.

The reason for the closures is simply that the smaller stores are uneconomical to trade from he said.

Thompson added that Dixons is currently looking at reformatting its remaining stores to provide more specialist customer care.

We invest a lot of time and effort in making sure our staff are equipped and informed on all products which can be difficult given the huge range that we stock.

Its true to say Dixons staff dont have the same level of focus on mobile products as say The Link which is a specialist chain but that is down to the fact that they have to focus on a much wider range of products.

We are looking at the possibility of having larger format stores split into sections with specially trained staff on hand to give customers the best level of support.

The promotion replaces the half-price line rental that had been offered on the same 3 contract tariffs.

The offer of half-price line rental was very successful but we decided to try something new said 3 sales director Marc Allera.

We had record sales last month on the back of the offer on line rental and we think we can emulate that with the new text offer. But value is a right not an offer and this text bundle will bring new customers to 3.

The offer of unlimited texts is subject to a fair-use policy. The customer actually has an upper limit of 3000 text messages per month.

Mobileshop.com has acquired the intellectual property rights of Fonetasticmobile.co.uk including its website software and brand name. Mobileshop.com will not take on any staff as part of the deal which was finalised last week.

We bought it because it was there said Mobileshop.com chairman Grenville Reeves. It was a competitor and its always good to buy out a competitor.

There were three others who bid for Fonetasticmobile.co.uk but the site decided that we were the best to do business with. We were able to move quickly and wrap negotiations up in a matter of days.

From start to finish including the integration of software it took three weeks. Thats all.

Mobileshop.com based near Doncaster has a staff of 75. That number will increase confirmed Reeves though he declined to disclose figures regarding either the takeover itself or increases in the workforce. The mobile dot.com will remain at its current premises.

Mobileshop.com and Fonetasticmobile.co.uk are a good business fit said finance director Gary Proctor. Theres no direct competition between the two business because they operate in distinct arenas.

The London distributor in conjunction with French manufacturer Sagem took eight top-performing dealers on a jaunt across Malaysia.

The party of 20 was made up of four European Telecom staff eight dealers and eight guests.

Weve done quite a few incentives in the past said European Telecom marketing manager Bruce Welland. But this is by far the biggest European Telecom has done.

The winners were chosen from European Telecoms dealer base for the number of Sagem handsets they sold. A points system was devised for sales of Sagem so that dealerships were awarded an entry in the Malaysia prize-draw for every 50 points they earned.

Its the first time weve run a promotion this way Welland said. It means the promotion was not just restricted to the biggest dealers in the country.

This time smaller dealers had a chance of winning because they can get two three or four entries to the prize draw.

The nine-day trip included four nights at the coastal resort of Shangri-La on the island of Penang and four nights in the Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur. Five-star accommodation was provided throughout. Highlights included trips to the Petronas Towers the second tallest in the world and the Malaysian Grand Prix.

I was told they spent 6000 to 7000 per head and there were 20 of us in total said Shaf Shah of Switch Communications in Birmingham.

With some of the trips Ive been on there has been a lot of waiting around for taxis and buses. But this was well-organised and relaxed.

It was the best promotional trip Ive ever been on said Paul Davis of Aerial Telephones in Portsmouth.

Ive been on promotional trips with O2 and Vodafone but this was the best of the lot.

Im a Formula 1 fan anyway but this was incredible. We sat in an executive box overlooking the starting line the pits and the McClaren stand. When youre that close you realise how fast and noisy the cars are Davis enthused.

European Telecom signed 30 new dealers through the promotion and is already planning its next.

We are already discussing destinations for our next promotion and will soon shop the ideas around companies who will subsidise the cost and share the benefits said Welland.

Our new address is Clark White Publications 102-108 Clerkenwell Road London EC1M 5SA.

Telephone: 020 7324 3500

Fax: 020 7324 3528

Ironically director Bryan Buckley has also shot Orange cinema commercials.

Virgin Mobile is currently shooting two different versions of the Aguilera commercial in Los Angeles.

One will be more edgy than the other. It will test the water to see what we can get away with said a Virgin Mobile spokesperson.

The Aguilera commercial follows Virgin Mobiles most recent outing in its The Devil Makes Work For Idle Thumbs campaign which has won plaudits for its own risque narratives starring hip-hop star Busta Rhymes.

Virgin Mobile would not deny that the commercial will test the boundaries of censorship.

Shes in a room and appears to be naked. But the viewer wont be able to tell exactly what shes doing right away.

It will be cheeky sexy and raunchy because of the way it is shot. But it will appeal to women too said the spokesperson.

It is a great coup for us to sign Christina. She is very wealthy so she is not just doing it for the money.

She has done it to raise her own profile and because she is happy to be associated with the Virgin brand.

3 hopes the handset will meet consumer expectations of a fair-sized mobile phone. It is expected to retail for 50 on a 3 contract but will not become available on ThreePay until the summer.

Its appearance is really impressive said John Hilli of Airdrie dealer Allsorts Communications.

Lee Edwards of The Phone Inn in Gravesend Kent added: A lot of potential 3 customers are looking for a smaller handset. This will fill that gap. It should be good for 3 because the size is better. A lot of people are put off 3 because the handsets are so large.

Dealers who have seen the LG8110 have said it looks like the

Samsung V200.

Its a very slightly different shape to the Samsung but it has the same dimensions and weight said Hilli.

I cant comment on user interface and usability because I didnt get the chance to have a play with it he said. But the tariffs are good on 3 and even if the interface is not great it will sell.

Jonny Marris of Mobiles in Hemel Hempstead said:

The interface is OK. It not as good as the Motorola V500 or the V600 but they are 2.5G phones. It is better than the NEC handsets but it doesnt have Bluetooth which could be a problem.

3 distributors already have the LG8110 in stock. It was delivered to larger retailers last weekend and will trickle down the channel this week.

Guinea pigs include Renault BAE Systems BT and the West Midlands Police Force. It is currently available as a free service on a two-month trial period with an xda 2 or a laptop with an O2 datacard.

Mainline will focus its recruitment drive on its sales team. There are also vacancies in Mainlines administration department and in credit control.

A total of seven jobs are waiting to be filled including the post of account manager which has just been vacated by Jonathan Ricketts.

Ricketts has tendered his resignation said Mainline managing director Andrew Boden. Its a private matter and I dont want to say too much more.

He went on: There are seven vacancies at Mainline at present. Some of them are newly created some of them arent. But only one account manager is moving on. The number of staff at Mainline at the end of the year will be higher than it was at the start.

The word on the industry grapevine was that Ricketts resignation came about because of frustrations with Oranges treatment of its distributors and dealers.

Thats not the reason said Boden. There are no problems with Orange. We are one of only two distributors that are part-owned by Orange and we have a good and profitable business with the network.

There were no sour grapes following his announcement. It is sad to see Jonathan go. He worked here for a long time. But there is nothing dramatic about his resignation.

Were a small company said Boden. We have only 60 staff. As new people start old staff leave. Thats the way it works. If anything we are expanding. We are planning to double the size of our sales team. There is a lot of work to do.