The British handset manufacturer had a massive falling out with one-time partner Microsoft claiming Microsoft revealed Sendo trade secrets to competitors. (Cont P2)

It is now fighting a legal battle with Microsoft following a bust-up over the Z100.

Sendo chief executive Hugh Brogan admitted that the fiasco with Microsoft had left a lot of Sendos customers very annoyed.

Brogan said of the impending court case: We believe we are right and we cant wait to go to court to get it all straightened out. The sooner it is finished the better. But we couldnt be happier with the cooperation we are getting with Nokia and Symbian. As a result we are ahead of schedule.

Despite the Microsoft issue Brogan said that Sendo grew 600 per cent during its 2002 financial year with a quarterly growth of 30 per cent despite a difficult year.

We are back on our feet and traded our way through a difficult time and still managed to grow the business he said.

We are now shipping into more than 40 territories. We have 60 customers of which 50 are operators. We have the second best market share in the Netherlands because of our partnership with operator KPN added Brogan.

We recognise we are a small player. We spend our time working with operators to develop relationships. We are not selling on prices. We are not the cheapest and our phones come out at the top of the entry-level segment. It is not price led it is the customisation of our proposition.

Sendo will soon launch a colour clamshell design phone called the M550 in response to the demand of its network customers for an entry-level clamshell handset with GPRS and colour display.

The M550 will be available in a number of European countries in the second quarter of 2003 and will be priced below 100.

Many of the parent companys other businesses were also placed under administration but RSL COM UK as one of its most successful has been selected to continue to manage its own operations RSL MD Barry Mowbray told Mobile News:

The situation we face will have no direct bearing on the operations performance profitability or business of RSL Com in any way. Similarly there will be no direct impact on UK customers suppliers business partners or staff.

Mowbray continued:

No one ought to be concerned about ongoing revenue or commission thats owed by RSL COM. I can categorically state that these will continue to be paid.

I can understand some people asking the question in the light of whats happened. But Id like to emphasise both that it is business as usual for the UK Company and commissions will continue to be paid as usual.

Price Waterhouse Coopers the parent companys provisional liquidators have indicated that they want to sell the business as a going concern. There are rumours of a management buyout being in the offing.

RSL COM UK has been ring fenced from the rest of the group in order that it can continue to operate and trade as normal.

Its US parent has since suspended interest payments on some of its bonds and reportedly deferred repayment of a $100m loan. It has already spent some $1.5bn on network infrastructure .

The claim was dismissed by TAP which said they had just served a statutory demand against Ali khan for 60000 of unpaid stock.

Ali Khan served the writ to recover legal fees incurred for using lawyers to serve statutory payment demands against TAP. He says he has been forced to use lawyers to requisition extraordinary general meetings and conduct negotiations with Nasa Khan to sever his business ties with TAP following his resignation as a TAP director last summer.

He claims TAP have breached his shareholder agreement on many counts including a denial of access to the companys books and accounts.

Most recently Ali Khan claimed he would be suing Nasa Khan for having him wrongfully arrest by Police at TAP premises on August 20. Police quizzed Ali Khan for several hours at Kingston Police over alleged threats against Nasa Khan.

Police later released Ali Khan on bail but later dropped the case due to a lack of evidence (Mobile News October 28 2002).

TAPs group managing director Bav Majithia denied any knowledge of Ali Khans latest action saying.

He told Mobile News:

To our knowledge there has been no notice served on us or Nasa Khan. We have served a statutory demand on Ali Khan for 60000 of un paid accessories that Ali Khan purchased at the beginning of last year explained Majithia.

Ali Khan responded by saying TAPs latest claim was ridiculous and denied having purchased any stock from TAP.

Ive not received this notice nor have I purchased any stock from TAP. They are going to have to prove that they delivered the stock.

Taiwanese handset manufacturer DBTEL plans to enter the UK market before Christmas with what it claims is the slimmest and lightest colour screen handset in the market.

DBTEL also claims (Cont P2)to have launched the worlds smallest clamshell WAP handset which has a dual screen display polyphonic ring tones and weighs 70g.

DBTEL head of sales and marketing Canice McKee says the company will focus on supplying handsets to operators to begin with before looking at selling directly to retailers and distributors.

We will be successful in the long term by adopting an operator strategy. It is the best way for us to start. We are close to announcing a deal to launch the DB2039 on one of the UK networks before Christmas. Operators are very interested in our product roadmap for next year. I am not saying we wont look at other routes to market but we will concentrate on operators first.

Our selling point is affordable colour display phones. We dont expect people to pay for technology that they dont want to use right now or the market is not ready for.

These are not low end products. The price has not been determined yet but we expect the DB2039 to be priced lower than Sagems MY X5 colour screen handset McKee told Mobile News.

DBTEL has been producing mobile phones since 1979 and McKee hopes to replicate its success in Asian markets over here.

tus right now.

However Signal Telecom group general manager Julie Brotherton told Mobile News that Hulme will continue to work for Signal on a consultancy basis to continue an ongoing restructure of the company.

Brotherton told Mobile News: David Hulme has left the company. He has been helping us restructure the business and will work with us on a consultancy basis to continue that.

David Hulme wanted to pursue other business opportunities but there was no way he could pursue those opportunities whilst being in the employment of Signal said Brotherton.

Its unfortunate that he has left the company but he will still be working with us over the coming months added Brotherton.

In the early hours of Tuesday August 13 thieves smashed through the distributors glass front doors as well as four subsequent doors to gain access to its secure warehouse.

Once inside the warehouse the thieves grabbed boxes of various Motorola Samsung and Nokia handsets.

Phone Direct managing director Alan Dugard said:

It is the first time we have been burgled and as a result we have spent a further 30000 on (Cont P2) enhancing the security system at the premises.

According to Dugard the thieves were on the premises for 45 minutes and carefully selected what to take. They picked and chose what they took. They knew what they wanted.

CCTV from Phone Direct and buildings around the area has identified the vehicles used in the burglary.

The incident came shortly after Ali Khan resigned as a TAP director (Mobile News August 5).

Police arrested Ali Khan on August 20 at TAPs premises as he arrived to attend an Extraordinary General Meeting. He was taken to Kingston Police station and questioned about alleged threats against Nasa Khan and members of his family.

Ali Khan was later released without charge on police bail pending further investigations.

He denies the allegations saying:

Police told me that they had received a complaint from Nasa Khan that I was making threats against him and his family.

The allegation made is completely unsubstantiated and without foundation. On August 20 I went to the head office of The Accessory People PLC to attend an EGM of the company.

I was first greeted by two security staff and then escorted into a musty and unclean side room. Five high-ranking police officers then bundled me into a police car that raced off at high speed to Kingston Police station.

I was informed much to my disbelief that I was being (Cont P2) arrested on suspicion of threatening the life of Nasa Khan and various members of his family.

After a short interview I was released without charge to the obvious embarrassment of the arresting officers. I intend to reconvene the EGM in the near future hopefully without further incident. My solicitor is handling all further matters.

TAP managing director Bav Majithia issued a statement saying:

We will not tolerate this kind of behaviour towards any TAP board members.

The board are in full support of any criminal action which may be taken against Ali Khan.

At the time of going to press no details of the alleged threats were available. TAP has not commented on the fact that Ali Khan was released on police bail without charge.

Ali Khan claims he has tried to speak to Nasa Khan to resolve the situation but claims that Nasa Khan is unapproachable.

AnP marketing director Bill Mann is in negotiations to appoint a UK distributor.

However he would not say whether any UK operators are likely to take the handsets into their product range.

We will appoint a UK (Cont P2) distributor soon. We only intend to appoint one distributor in the UK.

The first handset will start shipping at the end of August. We intend to attack the market on price Mann told Mobile News.

The first Daewoo handset to be launched will be a dual-screen flip-phone similar in design to Samsungs A300.

The DW 600 is a dual-band GSM 900/1800 handset with built-in organiser full graphical display 300-name/number phonebook WAP and a lithium Ion battery.

A second handset with GPRS will launch before Christmas. Daewoo intends to bring out a colour handset in the first quarter next year.

The winding up order was incorrectly served against Fonekit instead of Sell-line Corporation (trading as Fonekit).

The mistake occurred because Fonekit Ltd and Sell-line (trading as Fonekit) are both based in Eastbourne.

We served a winding up order against Fonekit. We assumed the company was Fonekit Ltd because the name Fonekit appears on all its invoices. We have now discovered the company we have been dealing with is Sell-line (trading as Fonekit) and is not Fonekit Ltd said Mobileshop.com boss Grenville Reeves.

We are in dispute with Sell-line Corporation (trading as Fonekit) over an unpaid invoice. We received a cheque for 7000 which bounced. We will be taking action against the company.

Sell-line financial controller Peter Scheldt agrees that there is a dispute but says it could easily have been avoided.

There is a commercial dispute between Mobileshop.com (Cont P2) and us. Mobileshop.com has owed us 400 to 500 for a year. We have been waiting for them to confirm we can offset this against what we owe them. This has been agreed. But we have not received the confirmation.

Scheldt said the cheque paid to Mobileshop.com bounced because the company changed bankers:

Mobileshop.com insisted we send them a cheque. We explained it would not clear as we were changing banks. We sent the cheque just to confirm the balance owed. We wanted to wait until we had cleared funds.

This has now occurred. The invoice can now be paid.

Mobileshop.com was foolish to insist on us sending a cheque. I am aware a winding up order has been served against a company called Fonekit Ltd which has no direct connection to us. I suspect it will be seeking some redress againstMobileshop.com concluded Scheldt.

The North East dealer and distributor is believed to owe T-Mobile around 6 million.

We have got cashflow problems. But it is not a clawback issue. We are working with T-Mobile to find a solution and we expect to have an answer shortly Cityphone boss Barry Donaghey told Mobile News.

We are undergoing a massive restructuring to cut overheads and streamline the business. There are no disputes with T-Mobile. We became aware of the problems at the beginning of this month. We have time to sort things out.

Donaghey said Cityphones problems were due to a decline in customer demand for mobile phones and reduced network commissions.

He admitted Cityphone over- extended itself by (Cont P2) purchasing too many shops including 30 WAP Store outlets it purchased for 700000 in January.

The shops were the biggest problem. We have now closed 12 stores and franchised over 50 of the remaining stores.

The franchised stores are profitable as is the distribution business he said.

Ironically Donaghey blamed the demise of the WAP Store for the same reasons he told Mobile News in January when he said of Wap Store founder Graham Cornhill that he overstretched himself at the wrong time.

T-Mobile head of sales and distribution Christina Meade was unavailable for comment.

T-Mobile head of external affairs Patrick Barrow said:

It wouldnt be fair for us to comment on another companys financial troubles.