The mobile phone segment of Siemens’ mobile communications group has a new boss after acting head Rudi Lamprecht handed over duties to former head of sales Ian Moyes.

Moyes, who has also been managing director of Siemens mobile UK, has global responsibility for the division, which is one of five divisions within Siemens Mobile, of which Lamprecht is overall head.
Moyes takes the reigns at a division which has seen flat sales over the past  year, but which is claiming better growth in the current quarter.
“With Ian at the helm of our mobile phone segment, we want to continue our growth path. The high demand for our current product range shows that we’re on the right track,” says Rudi Lamprecht. Siemens is currently number four globally by market share for mobile phones, and number two in Europe.

O2 has launched “Corporate Txt”, a  tool that businesses can use to make savings on sending and receiving text messages from their employees and/or customers.

Corporate Txt is a web interface that can be used by any user within an organisation. A company’s address book, or customer or contact database can be uploaded so that internal and external communications can be sent either individually or en masse. Responses can be routed directly onto the sender’s desktop inbox.
Companies can also adapt the service for different brands or departments using a variety of templates.

O2 has announced the availability of the new BlackBerry 7230 for enterprise customers in the UK and Germany, with availability in Ireland scheduled a little later.

A number of major corporations have ordered “substantial” quantities of the new device, the operator claimed.  O2 also announced that its BlackBerry solution for SME and professional consumer customers will be available from November.
The triband BlackBerry 7230 is the first colour BlackBerry device, and includes access to corporate email, company intranet, Internet browsing and phone capability.
O2 said it has sold around 32,000 BlackBerry devices to more than 1200 organisation to date.
Kent Thexton, chief marketing and data officer, mmO2 commented, “We are the leading provider of BlackBerry in Europe and are very happy to extend our BlackBerry portfolio further. We believe that we hold a strong position in this market, and have learnt a great deal from selling the original BlackBerry handhelds.”
l Blackberry developer, Research In Motion (RIM), has said that adding nearly 100,000 new Blackberry subscribers will enable it to beat revenue forecasts for the second quarter 2003.
RIM said that it expects revenue for the second quarter to be in the range of $123-$126 million, exceeding the previously forecasted revenue range of $105-$115 million. Net income for the second quarter is also expected to exceed initial forecasts.
RIM also said the provision for its ongoing patent litigation in the US courts is expected to be lower than the prior quarter, resulting from adjustments to previous estimates for professional fees and interest.
RIM expects the number of net new BlackBerry subscribers in the quarter to be between 94,000-97,000, which exceeds the previously forecasted range of 80,000-90,000 for the quarter. The BlackBerry subscriber base will now exceed 700,000 subscribers.
Dennis Kavelman, chief financial officer at RIM, said, “Global demand for BlackBerry accelerated in both enterprise and prosumer market segments as RIM fulfilled orders to its carrier partners to satisfy new subscriber growth, hardware upgrade sales and retail channel expansion requirements.”

Foundry Networks, the company well known for its enterprise switch products, is to launch a wireless portfolio.

The company will unveil standalone access points and will wireless-enable its Fast Iron Edge Switch and chassis-based solutions.
It intends to produce a high-end solution which will help its existing users to roll out wireless LANs.
“Wireless capability is the necessary add-on to the overall enterprise network infrastructure. Our wireless solution will seamlessly integrate with our line of enterprise switching and network management products,” said Foundry vp Ken Cheng.
The wireless portfolio will be rolled out in three stages.
Foundry will first release its access points, which will be dubbed IronPoint. The access points, which are due to be released during October, can be used as a standalone network, or can be used with the vendor’s IronView network management system.
The IronPoints will support all three wireless LAN standards — 802.11a, b, and g — which give up to 54Mbps theoretical throughput together with the newly-announced WPA security standard.
Foundry is then expected to wireless-enable its Fast Iron Edge Switch and Chassis solutions around the turn of the year. This will mean the products will be able to serve both the fixed and wireless networks.
The IronPoint will cost $945 and the software upgrade to wireless enable the switch will be priced at $1195.

Ericsson, Motorola, Nokia and Siemens mobile have completed their jointly developed Push to talk over Cellular (PoC) specification.

Based on the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) as defined by 3GPP, the specification is intended to reduce marketplace fragmentation and provide end users with an easy-to-use push to talk experience wherever they may travel in the world.
The PoC specification leverages existing 3GPP, OMA, and IETF specifications and is, in fact, a bundle of six specifications including: requirements, architecture, signaling flows, group/list management, and two user-plane specifications (transport and GPRS).
The companies have submitted this specification to the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) standards body for review as a baseline to provide an access-independent and globally interoperable standard for PoC.

Israeli start up Mobixell, which specialises in adapting real time mobile multimedia content to the specifications of the device for which it is intended, has attracted a $5million investment from a group of investors.

The investors, who number Siemens ICN subsidiary Siemens Mobile Acceleration, private equity company Apax Partners, Comverse and Optibase, have backed the company’s Mobixtar RMSC (rich media message centre). This is a tool which transcodes images, animation, audio and video and adapts it for the different devices, whether it be for screen sizes, colours, memory, processing power or camera quality.
“Mobixell Networks has potential to become the leading product for adapting and delivering mobile multimedia content in cellular networks, since it is the most attractive solution in this segment. The company’s product line creates a superior user experience, enabling mobile operators to create new revenue streams,” said Dr. Dietrich Ulmer, ceo of Siemens Mobile Acceleration.
“Securing funding from these leading partners is a major vote of confidence,” Amir Aharoni, president and ceo of Mobixell, said. “The investor-group represents an ideal partnership to assist us in penetrating and realising the growing markets of mobile multimedia adaptation, optimisation and delivery.”

Concern over the misuse of camera phones has led one company to introduce technology that disables the imaging functionality of a phone or wireless device when it is within a certain building or area.

Iceberg Systems’ Safe Haven is designed to allow businesses, schools or any other establishment to prevent the use of the camera part of a phone when it is within their boundaries.
Safe Haven works by sending a wireless node sending a signal to the phone delivering the message that this is a privacy zone. Software on the phone then disables the imaging functionality, leaving other uses active.
Once a user leaves the zone the imaging function is automatically reactivated.
For the system to work it relies on phones either having been built with the Safe Haven application integrated into the handset, or alternatively have had the application installed as a Java download.
The system is currently in beta tests with handsets and will be marketed by audio IP licensing company Sensaura, which said it is in talks with handset manufacturers about implementing the technology.
Neil Mawston, senior analyst, Global Wireless Practice, for Strategy Analytics says; “Privacy and security issues surrounding camera phones are a growing concern for consumer and corporate users. Using technology to diminish localised privacy and security risks is a proactive option.”
“Camera-embedded devices like camera phones represent a considerable step forward in technology. However, at times, they are prone to misuse,” Patrick Snow, managing director of Iceberg Systems, said.
“Safe Haven solves the serious threat to security and privacy presented by such misuse in a simple, controllable manner.”
The technology can also prevent the use of other types of wireless imaging devices including digital cameras, camera equipped PDAs or laptops, in a wireless privacy zone.

Personalised ring tones for the called party are old hat, but European Computer Telecoms has launched a service which will let operators offer subscribers the chance to substitute the normal ring tone a caller hears with a personal tone.

For a monthly fee the service will allow a user to change the normal national ringing tone heard by callers to his phone with a personal announcement, music or ringing sequence.
The applications is already being used by an ECT customer in Asia, and has now been made available to European operators.
ECT said that besides the surprise and fun effect for private subscribers, the ringback tone service also fulfils a business requirement for privacy. If, for instance, a German businessman is in England and receives a call via GSM roaming, the caller hears the UK ringing tone and thus knows where the businessman is, even before he answers the call. With the ringback tone service, the businessman could have all callers always receive the German ringing tone, regardless of the country in which he is currently using his mobile, ensuring privacy on his whereabouts. In Asia, the ringback tone service is already being offered successfully to business subscribers as a profitable premium service with a high monthly fee, ECT said on the launch of the service.
“Our application for ringback tone service offers mobile carriers a completely new feature to differentiate their service and supplement their income per subscriber. We are proud to be the first technology provider to enable this service and are looking forward to it becoming an important trend and moneymaker for our mobile customers,” Dr. Christian Kühl, chief sales officer of EC, said.
The ringback tone service is based on ECT’s AutoCarrier softswitch and includes a Web-based interface that allows the subscriber to upload his own messages, music or tones as Wav files and then activate his own personalised ringback tone. The subscriber can also change the ringback tone using interactive voice response.
SK Telecom in South Korea was the first in the world to launch personalised ring-back tones, and consumers are estimated to have spent EUR80 million in 2002 on the service, with the figure expected to increase sharply in 2003. SK Telecom now has 16 million subscribers signed up to personalised ring-back tones paying roughly EUR1.75 per month.
l Sicap, a wholly owned subsidiary of Swisscom mobile, has also launched a ring back tone service for the European market, called Tones4U.

Greek operator STET Hellas has deployed a LMDS wireless network to provide broadband wireless access and backhaul connectivity for its mobile services.

STET Hellas is using equipment and a management platform from Alcatel, enabling it, in theory, to be able to support TDM, Frame Relay, Ethernet, ATM and IP across the network.
Alcatel has supplied the LMDS basestations, as well as its 7270 service concentrator, which aggregates broadband traffic across the existing network, which already uses Alcatel’s 7470 Multiservice Platform.
Michele Gamberini, chief network officer of STET Hellas, said, “The Alcatel LMDS backhaul and broadband wireless access solution will support us in evolving our network towards higher grades of flexibility and cost-effectiveness.”
“LMDS represents an exciting opportunity for both fixed and mobile operators to deploy broadband wireless access and backhaul solutions,” Marc Rouanne, chief operating officer of Alcatel’s mobile communications group, said.

3G operator Hi3G Access AS has won a licence to provide services in Norway.

The operator, which is 60% owned by Hutchison Whampoa and 40% by Investor AB, paid NOK62 million for the licence, under the terms of which it must provide service to 30% of the population within six years.
Hi3G Access AS’ Swedish parent company, Hi3G Access AB, already offers 3G services in Sweden, and will shortly be opening up in Denmark. All the services are, or will be, branded 3, in accordance with Hutchison Whampoa’s other networks.
“3 brings a strong mobile video communication offering to the Norwegian market. We have started providing services in Sweden and will soon do so also in Denmark, which together with the rest of the global 3 network gives us a strong position to offer innovative services at competitive prices in Norway,” Chris Bannister, ceo for 3 in Scandinavia, said.