Vodafone Germany has one million live! users followed by the UK with 710000 users.

The network is now rolling out its service under licence to partner networks in which it doesnt have a controlling interest such as SFR in France and Swisscom in Switzerland.

Vodafone live! was launched on October 24 last year with the aim of promoting services rather than technology. Vodafone live! integrates WAP MMS and GPRS technologies with no intervention required from the user.

Live! customers have downloaded some three million games and more than 10 million polyphonic ringtones.

Live! launched with a multi-million pound advertising campaign on TV radio and billboards which depicted sporting icons David Beckham and Michael Schumacher using Vodafone live! to play games and send picture messages.

Nokia recently drew puzzled looks when it unveiled its teardrop-shaped 7600 3G phone.

The 7700 suggests the companys desire for innovative handset design shows no sign of abating (see White Lines P48).

The 7700 uses the Nokia Series 90 user interface. It has 64Mb of internal memory and an expansion slot for additional memory. Users can store content such as music and video files as well as back up data.

The 7700 can be synchronised with a PC using Nokia software and also supports Bluetooth audio.

The 7700 seems to be Nokias answer to Sony Ericssons P900 and even ventures into traditional PDA territory. It lets users view web pages with a full Internet browser.

It also comes with a 65000-colour touch screen video playback and streaming an integrated VGA camera FM radio and multimedia messaging as well as standard diary and address book features. The unit supports GSM/GPRS and EDGE. Shipments are expected to begin in the second quarter of 2004.

Nokias senior vice-president for entertainment and media Ilkka Raiskinen said the 7700 gave users instant access to media channels while on the move.

In another development Nokia has applied to de-list its shares from the London Stock Exchange.

Less than one per cent of the total global trading of Nokia shares takes place in London. Most trading occurs in New York and Helsinki where 25 and 60 per cent of trading volume takes place respectively.

Nokia expects the de-listing to take place around the end of November 2003.

The phone will first go to major retailers such as Carphone Warehouse. It will become available to independent dealers by the middle of the month.

I can see this being a huge seller for Christmas said Ian Robinson of MoCo Cell Link. Camera phones are really starting to take off and if you can offer one for less than 100 theyll fly off the shelves.

T-Mobile denies it is suffering handset shortages on a scale larger than Orange despite reports from dealers suggesting otherwise.

One dealer who talked on condition of anonymity said out of T-Mobiles 24 available handsets only six were available and all of them were on allocation.

Another said he was told there were no contractable phones whatsoever available.

The situation is absolutely appalling – it is probably worse than 3 which is saying something he said.

A T-Mobile spokesperson said that high numbers of connections might be a reason for any handset shortages.

The men are accused of robbing Graham Phillips of a Nokia in Notting Hill London on October 20.

They are trainee accountant Shofiqur Rhman (20) sales assistant Raju Ullah (19) student Neizam Uddin (22) and two 17-year-olds who cannot be named for legal reasons.

This is a good set of figures for Caudwell Group in another tough year for the mobile telecoms sector said CEO John Caudwell. We substantially grew volume turnover and profit – but pressure on margin remained a constant factor.

Phone Fix was the brand name for Service Xpress the repair company that Phones International bought from European Telecom in May last year.

Phone Fix was recently shut down and its outstanding business transferred to Total Repair Solutions.

Barry Jenkins of Jersey dealer Photo Sound says he was alerted to a problem when some handsets had still not returned from Phone Fix three months after they had been sent away for repair.

They should have come back in four weeks.

He says he chased Phone Fix without success but received a letter from TRS saying it had taken over Phone Fixs repair business. TRS says it cannot locate any of the missing handsets.

He claims he has had to replace the handsets or refund customers money.

This is not a satisfactory situation. TRS says some of the handsets are not on its system. Its a shambles said Jenkins.

We have had to replace three handsets for customers This has cost us 600.

The letter from TRS said we would experience a better service. It has actually got worse. We have been left in a difficult situation.

Phones International says it wrote to Phone Fix customers stating that the business was being transferred to TRS.

Phones International claimed it was forced to jettison Phone Fix after a change in Nokias repair payment policy and because of its inability to achieve accreditation with other manufacturers. The decision cost 12 jobs.

We are concerned that customers are reporting problems said Phones International Group marketing director Eric White.

I am happy to look into individual cases. We are still in a transition phase transferring the business to TRS.

White commented that the market for service and repair has been a challenging one.

We chose TRS on the basis of who could best serve needs of customers and support us as a group he said.

Siemens and Samsung have admitted they are all out of stock until the new year (see news P8). Nokia admitted that it had been having some problems on certain lines.

The shortages of Sony Ericsson kit is a blow to the joint-venture which has finally started to record positive sales figures and has seen its T610 become the fourth most popular handset in the market according to recent sales figures.

But like other manufacturers Sony Ericsson has been hit by an unexpected increase in demand.

Sony Ericsson marketing manager Peter Marsden said: We have done what we can do in terms of increasing production. But its not like turning on a tap. A shortage of supply for other manufacturers and the lateness to market of some of their products – as well as the popularity of our products – has led to an increased demand for us.

Only 1000 Aston Martin Motorola V600s have been made. The handset features the Aston Martin logo and has the sound of an Aston Martin engine as the ringtone. The handset also features video-clip playback an integrated camera quad-band technology and Bluetooth.

It comes in an exclusive Aston Martin gift box and is available from December 11 only through Aston Martin dealers.

Allera 31 joined 3 as director of retail sales in March 2001. He has been responsible for retail roll-out of 3 flagship and Superdrug stores which now number 160 as well as establishing and managing 3s relationship with its main retail partners.

Barton is believed to have become frustrated by the handset shortages that have hit 3s sales figures in the past few months.

Barton told Mobile News:

I have had offers outside of the industry which I am considering. 3 may well be my last job in cellular. I havent made a decision on my future yet.

He went on: I have done the job I came here to do. We achieved the fastest ever retail rollout of more than 150 stores in a year. Admittedly it isnt enjoyable waiting for the handsets to come through. When the handsets do start to come through in volume 3 is in a good position to see a rise in sales.

My goal was to make sure 3s distribution was right. The network is getting better by the day.

It has been a rollercoaster ride and 3 became the fastest-selling contract phone in record time. Im proud of what I and my team have achieved. We have always performed to targets.

The news has not come as much of a surprise to leading industry figures including some 3 distributors although Avenir Telecom MD Isahi Novick said he was surprised by the timing of the move.

It is a shame to see him go but Im not surprised he has left. There were a lot of rumours when Gareth Jones joined that he would be pushed aside at some point. I can understand that maybe he was frustrated that lack of handsets was holding back sales and it was an issue outside his control.

Fone Logistics managing director Ian Gillespie added:

Im not surprised John has left. These things happen. John is a nice guy. Ive known him a long time and I wish him well in what he is going to do in the future. I didnt have much to do with John on a day-to-day level. We reported into the head of distribution who reported into someone else below John. John ultimately reported in to Gareth Jones. Once Gareth joined 3 the management structure became top heavy. Maybe they decided to trim things down.

Orange head of sales Stuart Henry takes a similar view:

I wasnt sure how long John and Gareth would last together but that doesnt seem to have been a factor in his departure. He would have been frustrated at being a sales director with nothing to do. If I had no handsets to sell for two or three months I would be frustrated.

Anglia Telecom sales director Dave McGinn added:

When Gareth joined 3 the network took a different strategy and sales took off. Maybe John felt his nose had been put out of joint by the new management. Maybe there was a clash of personalities between John and Gareth. It would have been really frustrating to be in a position where you have such a strong demand for kit you cant fulfil.

Barton started his career at Vodafone moving to Talkland Phones 4U and One 2 One before joining 3.

Our story ended: Orange refused to comment.

In fact Orange had submitted a statement that we inadvertently omitted.

The statement said:

Like all networks we have a short-term supply difficulty primarily driven by volume constraints placed upon us by manufacturers late launches and cancelled launches due to quality issues. This has been exacerbated by an unusually high number of orders which we were happy to satisfy last month.

We expect this situation to be rectified in the coming weeks.

We are happy to set the record straight.