The decision means that Vodafone must now consult with Connect over the pay hours and holidays of its workforce located in the Midlands North of England Wales Scotland and Northern Ireland. This is the first time that the network has recognised a union in the UK.

Todays announcement comes after months of fruitless negotiations between Connect and Vodafone that led to the union issuing legal proceeding. The union has also submitted an application to the court for recognition that would cover Vodafone employees in the South of England.

Connect general secretary Adrian Askew said: This is a landmark victory for our members in Vodafone and it is a tribute to how they have come together to demand a say in their working lives.

Vodafone workers are calling loud and clear for a voice at work that is independent and professional. Our membership growth in the company has shown that even in the biggest of blue-chip companies employees understand that trade unions are still the only way to secure a truly independent voice.

The G600 is a slim-line slider handset containing a 5.0 mega-pixel camera 2.2 inch LCD screen with 16 million colours and full Bluetooth v.2 connectivity.

Samsung director Mark Mitchinson said: We know customers will love having advanced functionality and digital camera features in one compelling device. Additional benefits such as creative shot modes microSD external memory and the Image Editor will make the Samsung G600 a digital must have.

The G600 will hit stores nationwide in August.

HST already bills for fixed-line voice and mobile broadband. Its wholesale airtime deal will enable it to bill for mobile voice minutes. It will offer mobile voice and date billing to resellers as a white label service.

Hugh Symons Telecom managing director Hugh Roper said: We are in discussion with the networks now and will launch a wholesale airtime deal in the next quarter.

We want to provide for resellers that want to sell a converged solution not from a standard mobile price book but as a combination of hardware and services and billed minutes both fixed and mobile said Roper.

He added: We are doing this from a billing point of view because our product portfolio targets the fixed-mobile convergence space.

Mobile is a key part of the convergence proposition. With a wholesale airtime deal we can bill for the whole converged package fixed line mobile and internet.

All met stringent targets on new connections data sales 24-month contracts secondary devices and retention rates. They join already qualified Avenir in gaining access to an online marketing toolkit marketing funding O2 solution selling training and demonstration devices.

MoCo managing director Ian Robinson said: A few people probably wrote us off at the beginning and we are extremely pleased. It is a marker in the sand.

Fone Logistics marketing director Julien Parven said: It is recognition of the hard work and commitment we have shown O2.

Azzurri meanwhile is the first to join both its Advance and Data Centre of Excellence programmes after qualifying for the latter last week.

O₂ head of indirect partners and business mobilisation David Plumb said: Azzurri is a big player in convergence and a really important partner for us. O₂ is now training Azzurri sales people to sell data applications and solutions. This is a huge investment for us.

Its UK-based parent company Xebra which owns the brand licence to MVNO Extreme Mobile holds a 61.25 per cent share of Advantage Cellulars equity.

In April Warsaw-based company Centernet a subsidiary of Polish listed investment fund MFI Midas acquired 80 per of the shares of Xebra. Advantage Cellular is already connecting business customers direct.

The announcement comes three months after Telefonica sold the group to two Macquarie-managed investment funds.

Airwave CEO Richard Bobbett has revealed that the re-branding is an essential part of the companys expansion plans. Bobbett said:

We are now entering a new phase in Airwaves development as we refine and expand the existing service both in Great Britain and abroad.

In todays environment where the emergency services and public safety organisations are responding rapidly to ever-changing circumstances our ability to provide a trusted communications solution is more important than ever.

The job cuts will see O₂ reduce its German workforce to 4000 with most being axed from the operators administrative and central departments in Munich.

The network will also shake up its management structure by splitting it into two divisions network and service technology as well as setting up a new business division for product development and brand management.

O₂ Germany CEO Jaime Smith said: With our new management structure we are far more flexible and able to react quickly to changes in the market.

We are now in a strong position in a highly competitive marketplace to create higher efficiency within our central functions.

His capture follows the recruitment of former Carphone and Dextra web chief Mike Gray.

Beard joins as B2B dealer manager for Shebangs new Sellfone B2B sales software which enables B2B dealers to build quotes for multiples handsets track sales and replenish stock automatically.

Shebang managing director Iain Humphrey said: The B2B arena is where the networks struggle.

It is the sector where they most need quality entrepreneurial dealers. They can back their levels of service up now with this new computer system and Paul is on board to get the message out there.

Beard spent 10 years at Orange from 1990-2000. He left 3 in December during its staff cull after four years.

Its move into SIM-free sales follows the closure of Carphones Mobile Phone Express business last month. All its product lines come via Carphone.

HSC business manager Bob Sweetlove said: This is not about handset trading its about giving HSC dealers the opportunity to single source what they need for their customers.

HSC is offering dealers SIM-free kit on their existing HSC accounts through their account managers. Sweetlove said that by operating a single trade account model for all products purchased from HSC the accounts side is simplified so that dealers with limited resources do not waste time on administrative tasks.

The combined airtime/SIM free account also offers the dealers the opportunity to sell handsets with commission payments. However the system is not automated. Dealers will be able to calculate what they are owed in commission payments and offset it against invoices for SIM-free kit.

Sweetlove said: We are looking for ways to improve our service and product offering to dealers. We will look to develop additional services around SIM-free as required.

Just in the initial weeks of actively offering SIM-free weve been able to offer the Sony Ericsson S500i and the Nokia 8600 Luna at better prices than our competitors and in some cases are first to market.

He added: We want to be taken seriously in the SIM-free marketplace.

HSC is attempting to reassert itself as a full service distributor under the stewardship of Carphone following the termination of its Vodafone contract at the end of 2006.