McCarthy has been in the industry for over a decade. He spent two years at Motorola heading the launch of its BT Fusion handsets. Prior to Motorola McCarthy headed teams at both BT and O2.

McCarthy said: Ill use my experience along with a clear vision of the opportunities in convergence to strengthen HTCs market share in the UK and Ireland.

Asda has rolled its prepay offering to 99 stores already following its initial launch online in late April and will more than double that figure in the next six months.

Were planning to roll-out to as many of our big and medium-sized stores as well as our Living outlets which specialise in technology and entertainment said Asda Mobile buying manager Craig Thirkell.

When Asda Mobile started we could never have expected to hit the 250 mark so soon. The success both in-store and online shows what a great job our partners Vodafone and 20:20 Logistics are doing.

Asda offers a SIM-only pack for £4.97 including £1 of airtime credit. Prepay handsets online range from £19.97 (Nokia 1600) to £97.97 (LG¹s KG800 Chocolate).

MoCo is in talks with Orange about the commercial package and terms that will be made available to MoCo dealers.

Benefits will include dedicated dealer support an ongoing revenue share preferential stock allocation and increased marketing funds.

MoCo managing director Ian Robinson said: Were very excited. Its a great deal for our partners.

Moco already runs a dealer club for its O2 business connectors.

The role of retail and distribution chief is new to Sony Ericsson which plans to grow its non-specialist channels ahead of the Christmas quarter.

Beechs remit also covers accessories and the Irish market. He reports in to SE sales director Nathan Vautier. Beech will be in charge of a 35-man retail training team.

Prior to SE Beech spent five years as a senior trading manager at Tesco and five years as a network account manager at Ericsson.

His recruitment completes UK managing director John Harbers management team following the appointment of Vautier who joined in September and David Hilton who joined in October. SE had a bumper six months rarely being off the top of the UK handset sales chart. But it relied heavily upon network and specialist retail for its sales.

According to a statement issued by Spanish police a 28-year-old man was arrested in Valencia following a seven-month investigation. He is accused of creating and spreading over 20 different variants of the Cabir and Commwarrior worms which attempt to infect mobiles running the Symbian operating system.

Mobile viruses are not nearly as common as malware that strikes PCs on a regular basis but they are just as illegal in their intent. Viruses are not harmless pranks; they cause real harm disrupting business and personal communications as well as destroying and stealing sensitive data said Graham Cluley senior technology consultant for IT security and control firm Sophos.

Computer crime authorities around the globe are becoming more experienced at tracking down hackers and virus writers.

A recent survey by Sophos suggested 81 per cent of business IT administrators are concerned malware and spyware targeting mobiles will become a significant threat in the future but 64 per cent have no solution in place to secure smartphones and PDAs against the threat.

He is responsible for web development marketing and fulfilment for Shebangs Web 3G and Sellfone 3G software packages.

Gray who has 22 years experience in the industry helped launch web fulfilment solutions Vanilla Mobile and Actiweb at Carphone and Dextra respectively.

Shebang managing director Iain Humphrey said: We are not just about creating a sales arena for ourselves but increasing the opportunities and support we give to our dealers. Mike will enhance that.

Meanwhile Humphrey has promoted Shebang commercial manager Dennis Job to commercial director.

He will be responsible for overseeing and expanding Mainlines dealer accounts in the South of England West Midlands and Wales.

Edge has held sales management positions in Caudwell Communications and 4U Business.

His first challenge will be to recruit a dealer support executive for the South East who will work with him to maintain direct relationships with Mainline dealers.

On his appointment with the distributor Edge commented: As a dealer I dealt with Mainline because it was the key Orange distributor when it came to delivering high quality customer service.

Mainline managing director Andrew Boden said: He has a firsthand insight into the issues facing independents which will help our dealers to achieve their goals.

We have joined forces with the Premiership to create a private league where you can show off your football knowledge and win some great prizes.

Entrants will also be entered into a national league where they stand a chance of winning VIP tickets to a top Premiership match. The winner of the Mobile News league will also win a bottle of bubbly.

To register a team click here and once youve registered click on the Leagues link on the right of the page. Then enter the code 77455-19059 to join the Mobile News League.

Before this dotMobi the first internet address designed specifically for mobiles had kept these names on reserve while other domain names were sold or auctioned.

CEO of dotMobi Neil Edwards said: Cities will be able to use their .mobi sites to provide important city-related information to local citizens. These sites will also be able to provide compelling local information for visitors and help increase local tourist dollars.

City names are being made available for local governments for an initial period of two years with provisions for renewing the names. To apply governments must submit a short proposal that discusses how the planned domain use provides the mobile community with new features services and local content. The proposal must also address marketing and promotion plans.

Helsinki is the first city to trial the service.

Also available on U-Fix price plans new and existing customers who top-up before October 16 by more than £10 receive their bundle.

T-Mobile director of marketing Phil Chapman said: Weve spent a lot of time finding out how our pay-as-you-go and U-Fix customers want to be rewarded.

The overriding message that came out of our research was that they want a reward that theyll actually use one that is simple to understand and doesnt come with a lot of small print.