Vodafone has announced the release of its most affordable ultra low cost handsets to date, intended to give millions of people in emerging markets the opportunity to share in the benefits of mobile technology for the first time.

Launching in the first instance in India, Turkey and 8 markets in Africa – The Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique, Qatar, South Africa and Tanzania – it is in emerging markets such as these that the potential of the mobile phone as a powerful social enabler is most apparent. For example, more than 11 million registered customers across Vodafone's footprint now rely on their mobile phones for money transfers and bill payments. Vodafone is enfranchising its customers both by extending the countries offering such services and by rolling out more devices which give access to them.

To maximize the availability of the handsets across countries with sizeable and isolated rural populations, the launches will be supported by an extensive logistics infrastructure, reaching deep rural segments where mobile penetration typically remains low. In India, it is expected that device availability will reach 60% of the population.

Patrick Chomet, Vodafone's Group Director of Terminals, said, "The cost of mobile handsets can be one of the most significant barriers for people in accessing and benefiting from the growing number of socially valuable mobile services. The lives of people who use these phones – the Vodafone 150 and Vodafone 250 – will be changed and improved as they become part of the mobile society. I am proud of the work we have done and will continue to do in this critical area of customer empowerment."

The Vodafone 150 and Vodafone 250 both offer excellent voice and SMS services, as well as support for mobile payment services. The two devices share most specification features, the main differences between them being that the Vodafone 250's screen is both colour and slightly larger, and it has an FM radio.

By focusing on a custom-built feature set and packaging design – without any compromise to user experience, quality or safety – and by successfully leveraging vendor and partner relationships along the supply chain, Vodafone and handset manufacturer TCL have been able to significantly reduce the usual manufacturing costs and, therefore, the retail price.

The Vodafone 150 will retail unsubsidised at below $15 USD and the Vodafone 250 will retail unsubsidised at below $20 USD, depending on the local market.

Adobe and LiMo Foundation today announced that Adobe has joined the global consortium of mobile industry leaders to bring the Adobe Flash Platform to the LiMo Platform. Support for Flash within the LiMo Platform will enable developers and content providers to create applications that can run on LiMo devices. As a member of LiMo Foundation, Adobe supports the development of an independent, collaboratively developed handset platform that is commercially driven by some of the largest operators and OEMs in the industry, including LG, NEC, NTT DOCOMO, Orange, Panasonic, Samsung, SK Telecom, Telefonica, Vodafone, and Verizon Wireless.

"LiMo Foundation is distinguished as the neutral device platform provider for the mobile industry and our objective is to empower large communities of developers to flourish freely on LiMo Platform as it is deployed widely by leading operators and vendors," said Morgan Gillis, executive director of LiMo Foundation. "We are extremely pleased that Adobe as a true leader in application platforms that are enabling developers to bring rich new cinematic experiences to users across a range of screen formats has decided to join LiMo in order to align its technologies with LiMo Platform and collaborate within our open ecosystem to create fresh opportunities for developers to reach mobile consumers in all regions."

In joining LiMo Foundation, Adobe will enable application developers and designers to leverage Adobe Creative Suite and other Adobe authoring tools to create applications that will run on diverse handsets powered by LiMo Platform. Working within LiMo's open governance constructs, Adobe will collaborate with other LiMo members to augment LiMo Platform with the Flash Player porting API, greatly simplifying the integration of Flash into LiMo devices.

"Bringing the Flash Platform to LiMo opens up a significant opportunity for Adobe to further its goals of open standards and multi-screen interoperability of rich mobile content," said David Wadhwani, general manager and vice president, Flash Platform Business at Adobe. "Following the goals of the Open Screen Project, the openness of Linux and the Flash Platform represent a common vision to enable consumers to engage with rich Internet experiences seamlessly across any device, anywhere."

Launched in Jan. 2007, the LiMo Foundation was formed to deliver an open and globally consistent Linux-based mobile platform for use by the whole industry to catalyze next-generation mobile consumer experiences. The LiMo Platform supports execution of native applications as well as mobile Web applications and widgets. Third party developers will be able to leverage SDKs from LiMo members starting Q2 2010 for creation of native and web applications.  Through today's announcement it is anticipated that the large number of developers in the Adobe developer ecosystem will now also be able to use common Adobe authoring tools in order to create highly immersive and interactive content for consumers around the globe.

ZTE, a provider of telecommunications equipment and network solutions, has today revealed the T-Mobile Vairy Touch II, a light and stylish touch-screen mobile phone.

The Vairy Touch II will be available to T-Mobile UK pay as you go users from March. 

The launch of T-Mobile Vairy Touch II follows the T-Mobile Vairy Touch, which has been sold to over 120,000 subscribers since its launch in March 2009. The new version boasts a slick and slim design with a 2.8" PDA-style touch screen. The tri-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE handset includes a 2.0 megapixel camera, Bluetooth, FM radio, and games.

"While the media hype has predominantly focused on handsets at the premium end of the portfolio, all our customers expect a compelling user experience.  The great success of the Vairy Touch opened up access to a superior touch-screen user experience at an affordable price point. The Vairy Touch II reinforces our commitment to delivering the best quality handsets to our pay as you go customers," said Nicola Shenton, head of handset and device marketing at T-Mobile UK.

"Leading mobile operators such as T-Mobile require tailored handsets that offer subscribers an enhanced user experience. The T-Mobile Vairy Touch II showcases a larger, easy to use touch-screen, more internal memory and a slimmer, lighter design than its predecessor", said Mr. Wu Sa, Director of Mobile Device Operations, ZTE (UK) Ltd.

The Vairy Touch II is available in T-Mobile shops for £59.99 on pay as you go. 

ZTE is the world's 6th largest mobile phone manufacturer and the world's second largest supplier of data cards, according to shipment volumes. By the end of 2009, ZTE had cooperated with eight of the world's top 10 operators in the handsets space. In the UK ZTE is a supplier to all Tier 1 UK carriers.

NEC announced today at MWC that it will build the first Norwegian femtocell network for Network Norway. 

Network Norway will provide its enterprise customers with NEC's femtocell access point to plug into their broadband router.  In addition, NEC is providing Network Norway with the NEC femto gateway and access point management systems which can aggregate and connect thousands of access points to Network Norway's core network.

Arild E. Hustad, chief executive officer, Network Norway said, "Our customers demand mobile services with excellent, stable quality. Poor indoor coverage has for a long time been an issue that needed to be solved. With NEC's femtocell solutions we are now able to carry out a pilot to commercially and technically test state-of-the-art phone services solving the problem with indoor coverage, as well as a continuous, high-speed broadband service."

NEC's low-power femtocell access point will provide a dedicated 3G network indoors for personal use by Network Norway's customers, eradicating the "no bar" coverage that mobile phone users experience within buildings.  The dedicated coverage will enable Network Norway to offer those customers who have poor indoor coverage to access their favourite mobile media services on their handsets and 3G-enabled net books.

"Mobile operators are under constant pressure to offer a competitive service; femtocell is a way they can differentiate with the indoor five-bar coverage required to access capacity-intensive applications that consumers want," said  Fredrik Tumegard, CEO, NEC Scandinavia. "By providing a femtocell service to its customers Network Norway is leading where we believe other mobile operators will soon follow."

RAD Data Communications has announced that it has become the first vendor in the industry to deploy Carrier Ethernet mobile demarcation devices (MDDs) that incorporate timing over packet capabilities with enhanced SLA assurance tools. The deployment was made by a major Tier 1 European fixed-mobile carrier.

MDDs are deployed to mark a clear demarcation between the mobile operator's network and the transport provider's network. RAD's MDDs enable carriers and operators to benefit from advanced traffic management, enhanced performance monitoring and sophisticated timing over packet technology, all of which provide end-to-end service level agreement (SLA) assurance. 

"For new mobile networks, which will run converged data and voice over packet transport, there is no real alternative to having an MDD because it's not feasible to provide SLA assurances only from the edge," states Ronen Guri, Director of Product Management and Business Development for Mobile Backhaul Solutions at RAD Data Communications.  "They must provide it end-to-end instead, and that can only be done with an MDD," he explains. "Mobile operators, therefore, will be demanding that their transport providers deploy MDDs so that they will be able to verify the SLAs that have been contracted end-to-end."

RAD's SyncToP timing over packet suite, which the company has incorporated into its MDDs, combines IEEE 1588-2008, Synchronous Ethernet (Sync-E) and Adaptive Clock Recovery. This unique flexibility supports the simultaneous use of different clock transfer methodologies. This provides backhaul suppliers with the ability to match different clocking technologies used by the transport network and the base stations, as well as help them reduce capital expenses (CapEx).

"RAD's MDDs surmount a major hurdle in moving to an all packet backhaul network," Guri concludes. "Their best-of-breed attributes provide superior performance and robustness compared to other solutions available in the market."

Mentum, a wireless access and backhaul network planning and optimization company, has unveiled its newest product line, Mentum Fusion, at Mobile World Congress.

Mentum Fusion is a server-based, cloud computing platform that streamlines network planning, optimization and management tasks. Mentum Fusion enables operators to tackle the challenges associated with the ever-increasing pace of data traffic growth, the roll out of network overlays and the introduction of new wireless services while minimizing operational and network costs, throughout the entire network life cycle. It delivers functionality such as:

  a.. Automatic generation of network coverage maps and network KPIs
  b.. Data exchange automation between engineering and operational systems
  c.. On-demand visualization and analysis of wireless coverage, KPIs and network configuration through customizable web portals
  d.. Integration into other key systems such as OSS through open web services

"Network operators are under increasing pressure to improve operational efficiency when it comes to the management of their wireless networks. With Mentum Fusion, we are introducing a platform which can be used to automate proven engineering methodologies and extend the network operators' most important asset: its wireless reach," said Bernard Breton, Chief Operating and Strategy Officer at Mentum. "With the SON vision being clearly spelled out by the 3GPP, Mentum Fusion enables operators to take the first step towards leveraging the benefits of automation. We are excited about the launch of Mentum Fusion and the possibilities it offers to network operators."

Mentum Fusion has been successfully deployed by three tier-one customers.

Sagem Wireless today announced the launch of Cosyphone, said to be a connected lifestyle device aimed at the over 50's market. Cosyphone combines the latest technology such as NFC with a simple yet elegant design and easy-to-navigate user interface to create a connected device which is customised to the specific lifestyle needs of an older generation of mobile phone user.

Cosyphone is designed to be ultra simple and elegant, with an ergonomic form factor and user interface to simplify access to the features users want quickly and easily.  Cosyphone uses contactless NFC technology (near-field communications) to enable users to access the features of the device without scrolling through menus on the handset.  Users can create pre-configured and customised shortcut cards (or "tags") for friends and family, or services such as the doctors or the supermarket, and simply wave their device over the cards to activate the call or text message. Shortcut cards can also be used for data services, for example accessing the latest weather or traffic information on the phone's browser.

With its sleek, attractive form factor, Cosyphone is a stylish device that places a heavy emphasis on simplicity of use and style.  Unlike many mobile devices which require small and nimble fingers to operate, Cosyphone has a large keypad with raised and separated number keys.  Number and text input is simplified by the width of the key surface area, and the key shape is rounded on the top for better tactile awareness. In addition, micro-vibration feedback gives the user assurance they have pressed the right key.

The Cosyphone is stylish. Unlike other phones for this market, the Cosyphone is sleek but easy to hold and operate.  The display is adequately large and the fonts are very legible in various lighting conditions.  The device also comes with an innovative recharger cradle that is also designed for ease of use; the phone slides in easily and does not require any cable attachments.

Thierry Buffenoir, CEO, Sagem Wireless commented: "Everything about the Cosyphone is centred around comfort and simplicity, from the shape, weight and display of the device to the user interface and charger cradle.  We have integrated the latest NFC technology to enable users to customise how they access the features they require from a mobile device.   Despite such a wide variety of devices on the market, with an aging population in Europe there is an opportunity for a simple, effective connected lifestyle device which makes life easier. Cosyphone fills this gap in the market."

Cosyphone will be sold through mobile network operators.