It means more than 1100 industry people will attend The Mobile News Awards black-tie gala dinner/dance which takes place on March 15 next year at the Hilton on Park Lane. An entry form for the Mobile News Awards is with this issue. Call 020 7704 7440 if your entry form is missing.

Production of the 5 vouchers ceased in July. But stocks are expected to last until the end of February. Users will still be able to top-up for 5 electronically.

But the end of the 5 voucher has caused cash flow and clawback problems for some smaller retailers.

Weve had enough trouble trying to sell pre-pay phones from July because Orange have been clawing back dealers if a phone remains unconnected or if it is not topped up within three months said Paul Hull from PSH Telecom in Loughborough.

To prevent a 55 clawback penalty weve been supplying the phones with a 5 voucher. Now well have to supply a 10 voucher which reduces our profit margin. We already have to cut prices to compete with the supermarkets. Now we are going to lose an extra 5 on every sale. It slashes our profits to 8.50 per box. I dont know how much longer we can afford to do this. Im sure Orange shops and the big retailers like Sainsburys arent being treated in this way said Hull.

We never even see them offer customers a voucher never mind registering their name and address. If it gets any worse we will have to stop selling pre-pay its as simple as that.

Id love to have a one to one with Gareth Jones (Orange director of sales). I wonder if he could run a business selling his own Orange products.

Dealer Vic Hockley from Ilford East London added:

The dealer now has even more of a cash flow problem. Orange are making dealers work harder for their business.

The Gloucester arm of the business (formerly Advanced Telecom) home to much of RSL Coms consumer base is in the final stages of being sold as a going concern.

RSL Coms European MD Barry Mowbray said personnel affected had been told and redundancies would take effect by the end of the year.

Around a month ago we announced to staff that we were moving out of our business to consumers and concentrating on business-to-business activities. They have since been appraised of the redundancies and we have put in a great deal of training and support infrastructure to help the people affected.

RSL Com and all the directors have put in a huge amount of effort over the past six months in order not to take have to take this decision. We tried everything we could think of to maintain our presence in the consumer marketplace. The fact is you cant buck the market.

So many of our consumer customers are enticed by pre-pay and there are stronger brands in the marketplace than RSL Com which is not really a consumer brand.

We owe it to the company and our remaining staff that (Cont P2) we concentrate on what we are good at. What we are good at is business-to-business fixed line mobile data and internet services. So thats where we will be concentrating all our focus and effort.

Mowbray denied the redundancy of 10 per cent of staff meant the eventual demise of RSL Com.

The workforce has grown by some 250 this year alone. Any company has to embrace change and thats what we are doing.

Our consumer base is a combination of the result of both the acquisition of Motorola TelCo and Advanced Telecom. We are close to a deal which will see our selling all of the RSL Com consumer base.

We are however retaining Advanced Communications business customers.

We have tried absolutely everything to maintain and grow the consumer side of RSL Coms business.

Weve run campaigns and cut prices;. Weve linked fixed line to mobile. There are some tremendous people in RSL Com who have tried really hard to make a go of the consumer business.

But at the end of the day you have to make some profits in this business. We were not seeing the level of return that we wanted.

Over the last year we have re-focused the business to make it into a business-to-business organisation.

Our move away from consumer business has not come as a surprise to anyone in the industry because we have been moving away from consumers for some considerable time.

All our business partner relationships are focussed on concentrating on the higher spending business customers. It has been a very tough call to make and I didnt take the decision likely.

We have put in a considerable infrastructure to support those who are affected by the decision.

The plan is for all of the changes we need to make to be implemented by the end of the year Mowbray added.

The robbers drove up to the warehouse forced an entry and grabbed a quantity of handsets activating the security alarm.

The alarm automatically summoned the police within minutes but the gang escaped. The raid was caught on video surveillance cameras.

The sale of the brand applies to the UK and all Fone Range overseas markets except Ireland Spain Germany Switzerland Austria and India. Licensing and product development subsidiary Fone Range Partnerships (and its Warner Bros. licensed character range) together with design and production subsidiary Nexus Tec (which produces the Face brand of facias) are unaffected and will now be further developed and expanded.

The Fone Range Group remains under the current ownership. It will continue to operate from its Park Royal North West London head office. The boards of both companies are unchanged.

In addition to the Fone Range brand Fone Range customers will now also be offered the Elite accessory range as well as its portfolio of handsets and vouchers.

Fone Range managing director Jay Pau described the move as benefiting the customers of both companies. (Cont P2)

Customers will not only continue to have uninterrupted access to Fone Range products they can also enjoy one-stop shopping with all their accessory requirements handsets and vouchers available from one source. Elite enjoys a similar reputation to Fone Range for product quality and customer service.

A Fone Range spokesperson added:

The sums involved are substantially higher than 500000 each for the brand and the stock). Suppliers are free to trade with Elite. All of our financial responsibilities will continue to be met. Jay Pau will ensure the smooth transition of the brand to Elite. He will then be concentrating on developing the other parts of the Group and on developing new areas. Fone Range remains in a healthy financial position.

The deal was made because it was judged to be strategically appropriate within changing market conditions allowing the Group to focus its strengths on both developing new areas in the UK and overseas. All matters relating to the brand have now been transferred to Elite and our customers have immediate and automatic continued access to the Fone Range products as before.

There will unfortunately be some inevitable redundancies but we are putting our best efforts into placing staff either externally or within the Fone Range Group.

Elite head Ajay Gokani added:

At the time of going to press the contracts were due to be signed. We cant disclose the amounts involved due to a non-disclosure agreement so youll have to go with the rumours.

We shall be responsible for supplying goods to Fone range customers from today (November 13) From today we will be responsible for all warranty claims and deliveries. Fone Range will be responsible for all warranties and credits on goods supplied before that date.

Elite and Fone Range brands will continue to run side by side. Well differentiate between the two brands by using a higher quality product to make the Fone Range brand more exclusive.

This probably wont take effect until February next year.

Fone Range will be changing the group name within three months. Fone Range operations overseas have two years to change their names.

We will be looking to push Fone Range products in European countries not covered by Fone range. The European business will be run from the UK.

Our market share is probably around the 10 per cent to 12 per cent mark today and the acquisition takes us up to the 20 per cent mark. We are looking at other acquisition opportunities as and when they become available. Well be recruiting about 15 to 20 new staff on and we have already taken on some ex-Fone Range staff.

There are no direct family connections between our family and Jay Paus except that our fathers ran businesses next door to each other about 20 years ago. Our families know each other very well and started in the accessory business about the same time said Gokani.

We wont be moving into the licensed market unless we deal with a company that has acquired the licenses already. Its not our specialty. We want to stick with what we do best and thats distribution. Its impossible to concentrate on all areas of the accessory market. We were offered the opportunity to do a deal back in August he added.

I understand Jay (Pau) wants to concentrate on the licensing opportunities. He already has a big deal with Warner Brothers and I believe they may have a new one with a major Cola company. I cant say Jay took on too much but I wouldnt try to take on licensing at the same time as trying to run a healthy distribution business said Gokani.

Investec has informed us it was not engaged by 1st Line at any stage did not plan 1st Lines flotation and did not give any formal valuation of 1st Line.

Our statement that Investec was planning a stock market flotation was incorrect and we are pleased to set the record straight.

An Amstrad spokesperson admitted: we aimed for a date and missed it. We intended to go into production in the last quarter so there was only a small possibility that a few handsets may have ended up on the shelves this Christmas he said.

The delay has already meant a slump in Amstrads share price after Amstrads stockbrokers Beeson Gregory had slashed by half Amstrads 2001 profits forecast.

Amstrad was due to have commenced production this quarter It intended to supply handsets to a single operator in each country with an emphasis on operators own branding on the handsets. The handset has received type approval and is currently undergoing trials with operators worldwide.

He is understood to be actively looking for a senior post back within the mobile comms business. More departures are expected as morale within the company dips.

I feel I have contributed to my own redundancy as it was me who suggested that Panasonic should amalgamate the technical support engineers and the sales and marketing people. I think they have been careless in letting key people go. I dont think they have looked at the bigger picture Hore said.

Sources within the company admitted that morale within the company has slumped because of new management and the fact that handset sales had not quite reached expected levels due to Panasonics reluctance to meet network operators price points.

Panasonic officially maintains that Marsden and King have left on amicable terms. But the fact they are going to rival handset manufacturers must jar.

Said King :

I had a very positive experience both as account manager and then as marketing manager. I see in Alcatel an exciting challenge and I look forward to achieving success with upcoming product launches in the UK.

Marsden is business unit manager for Sony UK and Ireland and starts on December 4.

I had been at Panasonic for over 11 years and it was probably a bit too long. Im 38 years old. If I was ever to leave Panasonic it would be better to do so sooner rather than later he said

The timing is right because Panasonic is about to undergo some major structural changes and it raises doubts as to where I would fit in with those changes.

Panasonic is still in a good position for the future. Sony have some serious plans in regards to mobile. Until now Sony have only dabbled in mobile phones. But with new phones like the Z and J5 they have a real product to start targeting operators and retailers with.

They have the all important content that sets them apart from other manufacturers.

Content is the key to the short term as well as connectivity to other devices.

The fact that Sony has all these abilities in house helped persuade me that this was the right move Marsden told Mobile News.

The promotion was designed to incentivise more use of the phone and loyalty to the network.

Customers received 10 Air Miles on joining one Air Mile for every 10 spent on line rental and calls and a quarterly bonus of 10 Air Miles. Customers get a years worth of Air Miles based on a average call spend as a farewell gesture at the end of January.

An Air Miles spokeswoman said that Air Miles is in discussions with other network operators about starting up a new scheme and will imminently be making an announcement.

Air Miles has been around for 12 years and has accrued over six million collectors.

It is still offered by many organisations such as American Express and Sainsburys.

And the network has threatened similar action over the coming weeks with other dealers/distributors engaged in the practice. The network will not reveal the names of the companies it has black-listed.

The practice of distributors/dealers acquiring as much stock as possible before breaking it down to its constituent value parts and then shipping the handsets abroad is costing the network millions of pounds a month.

One 2 One sales and distribution director John Barton told Mobile News:

We will be doing all that is in our power legally to ensure that we do not suffer in this way. We put subsidy into the pre-pay box to have it connected to the UK network (Cont P2) not to have the thing disappear into thin air.

We will be withholding supply where the data we have available points to a disparity between the PCNs registered where IMEIs are not. We will simply stop supply. We are under no obligations to supply this product as long as we give good reason. I am happy to sell this sort of operator as many SIM packs as they would like said Barton.

What I will not do is sell them telephones which will not be connected to the One 2 One network. That is simply not the name of the game he added.

Dealer Channel management has issued termination notices to five or six organisations. I have no hesitation in backing them to the hilt as regards this action. The facts and the data we have access to speak for themselves. That deliberate box breakage is taking place is a matter of record. The evidence is incontrovertible Barton explained.

Statistics show massive discrepancy with some channel partners between the IMEI numbers sold and their appearance on the network. The rogue channel partners know whats going on.

This isnt about a proportion of phones being left turned off in glove boxes. Its far far bigger than that. Where we find cases of systematic box stripping and where we have the right to we will take action because we feel we are being abused.

We are not talking here about a mistake or one shipment thats gone wrong. We are talking about people who take me to be an idiot. Whilst on some occasions I may be foolish I dont want to be thought of as an idiot.

Barton denied that One 2 One had sacked retail account managers who were alleged to be knowingly supplying more product than was being connected.

Any rumours to the effect that One 2 One personnel have been sacked because of box-breaking activities are completely without foundation.

One individual who used to have dealings with The Carphone Warehouse resigned. But there is no suggestion at all that was anything to do with box breakage said Barton.

Another individual Steve Fraser who used to manage the dealer sales side has resigned from One 2 One and because he is moving to a competitor he left immediately.

What happens in situations like this is that a couple of people resign and the rumour mill goes into overdrive.