Global mobile sales up 15%

Strategy Analytics says 297 million mobile phones were shipped worldwide in the second quarter of 2008, a 15% year-on-year increase. Perhaps surprisingly, the worldwide growth rate is higher than it was at any time during 2007. [Report summary]

Andrew Harrison leaves Carphone board for Best Buy

Carphone Warehouse UK chief executive Andrew Harrison is stepping down from the Carphone Warehouse Group board to take a position on the Best Buy Europe board. He will remain in his existing role and will also take charge of the Best Buy Europe joint venture. [Source: Mobile News]

Over 2 billion wireless broadband customers by 2015

Researchers at Analysys Mason say there'll be 2.1 billion wireless broadband users worldwide by 2015, with most using mobile phone technology. These users are expected to generate $784 billion in 2014, which is an increase of 2400% from today. [Press release]

Motorola announces profit

Motorola's second-quarter results show that the company has made a profit of $4 million and is maintaining its market share with sales of over 28 million handsets. [Press release]

O2 offers combined home and mobile broadband service

O2 has announced a new broadband package that combines 3G mobile access with a landline connection and WiFi router. It also includes WiFi access via The Cloud. The deal will be available from 1st August. [Sources: VNUnet.com; Telecoms.com]

Nokia cuts handset prices

Nokia has been cutting phone prices during July, according to a report from Reuters. It's cut up to 10% off some handsets, putting pressure on rival manufacturers. [Source: Reuters]

Sagem Mobile splitting

French air and defence company Safran is separating its Sagem Mobile business. The new company will be called Sagem Wireless and will be controlled by Sofinnova, a French venture capital firm. The software part of Sagem Mobile is being sold to Purple Labs, which recently bought Openwave. [Safran press release; Purple Labs press release]

Israel publishes mobile phone health guidelines

Israel's Health Ministry has published guidelines about mobile phone usage. The ministry's head of public health says they contain "absolutely nothing new" and are based on information that's already been released by other organisations. [Source: Jerusalem Post]

Garmin delays new mobile phone

Sat Nav company Garmin says its nüvifone handset will not launch at the end of 2008 but will be delayed until the first half of 2009. It says meeting mobile network requirements is taking longer than anticipated. [PDF press release]

Carphone Warehouse publishes quarterly figures

The Carphone Warehouse Group has released quarterly trading figures for April, May and June 2008. [Press release]

Problems with Vodafone's Ghana Telecom deal

The last few weeks have seen a number of Ghanaian politicians expressing unhappiness with Vodafone's plans to own a majority share in Ghana Telecom. The Ghana Broadcasting Corporation has a summary of the situation.

LG adding Dolby sound to mobiles

LG Electronics and Dolby Laboratories have announced an agreement that'll see Dolby Mobile technology added to LG's handsets. As we mentioned in February, Dolby Mobile is an audio processing technology platform that's designed for mobile applications. The new LG multimedia phones with Dolby Mobile technology will be available from the fourth quarter of 2008. They're the first globally-available phones with Dolby Mobile; the world's first Dolby Mobile phones were released in Japan by Sharp earlier this year. [Press release]

Girls want mobiles sooner than boys

Here's one of those "obvious when you think about it" pieces of research. Teenage girls want mobiles earlier than teenage boys, according to a survey in the USA by MultiMedia Intelligence. Although there's little difference in mobile phone ownership at the age of 13, there's a large gap between the genders by 17. In 2007, 91% of 17-year-old American girls had mobiles but only 78% of 17-year-old boys had them. Generally, mobile ownership by teenage girls increases with age, while usage by boys jumps at ages 13 and 16. [Press release]

Mobile News podcast now online

This week's Mobile News podcast - sponsored by Supercover Insurance - takes its regular in-depth look at industry headlines from the last seven days. There's also an interview with United Mobile's John Peck about VoIP and a preview of the new S2 Skypephone. The broadcast can be downloaded from TheFonecast.com, from the Mobile News website, via iTunes or from our RSS feed.

UK mobile internet and text use continues to rise

The Mobile Data Association's latest report, which covers January to May 2008, shows that SMS and mobile internet use is still growing. 212 million text messages are now sent in the UK every day, with annual growth expected to be around 30% for the year. Meanwhile, mobile web use is up 25% in the last two years to 16.5 million people per month. Growth in MMS is also good, up 30% from May last year to 46 million messages per month. [Press release]

Physiotherapists warn against active text life

The Chartered Society of Physiotherapy is warning against text message injury (TMI) with news that one in six (16%) of 16-24 year olds experience discomfort in their hands when they send text messages. They're urging people of all ages to keep messages short, with a recommendation to use abbreviations and the predictive text function. They also say texters should try to restrict text sessions to 5-10 minutes and avoid holding the phone if they are not using it. The CSP has created a 5-step programme to safer texting:

1. Hold the phone up with the screen facing towards you so you are not having to flex your neck too much as you look down to view the screen.
2. Keep your hands close to your body. The weight of a phone may not feel much, but the load on your arm is significantly increased if the arm is held out stretched and this action will put strain on your neck and shoulder muscles.
3. Try to use both hands together when texting to “spread the load”. Keep messages short and use abbreviations and the predictive text messaging feature on your phone. This will help reduce the repetitive motion of pressing various keys.
4. Don’t text continuously. Try to take breaks by putting the phone down between text messages.
5. Carry out the following two exercises to prevent text message injury:
   Regularly open your fingers and stretch them out.
   Stretch your arm out, rotate your wrist so it is facing upwards and with your other hand pull your palm down towards the floor to feel a stretch over the front of your forearm muscles. Hold for 15 seconds and repeat 2-3 times.

Ex-Vodafone man to head Tesco Telecoms

Lance Batchelor, who joined Tesco as UK Marketing Director last year after leaving a similar role at Vodafone, will become chief executive of Tesco Telecoms in the next few months. [Source: BrandRepublic.com]

Carphone to drop Vanilla Mobile web service

Vanilla Mobile, the "white label" fulfilment service from The Carphone Warehouse, is to cease trading from 22nd August. It offered dealers a complete web-based sales operation, including credit checking and handset supply. Dealers who used Vanilla Mobile are being offered the opportunity to join affiliate schemes via e2save and OneStopPhoneShop, two other Carphone Warehouse companies. [Source: MobileToday.co.uk]

BBC Trust launches consultation about mobile TV

The BBC Trust has asked for comments about the BBC's plans to make its TV and radio channels available to UK mobile phone users on 3G networks. A trial earlier this year, which offered BBC TV on Orange, T-Mobile, Vodafone and 3, attracted peak usage of just 580 views in June 2007 and an average 13 minutes watched per month. [BBC Trust consultation; PDF document]

Mobile map usage up 72% in UK

The latest comScore M:Metrics report says maps on mobile phones are becoming increasingly popular. Year-on-year growth for the three-month period ending May 2008 shows that 4.5% of UK mobile phone customers have used mobile maps, which is a 72% increase. Overall, 3% of Europeans and 8% of American mobile subscribers access maps from their mobiles. In the US, the iPhone is the favourite choice for map users, while it's the Nokia N95 in Europe. When it comes to software, 73% of customers accessing maps are doing it via their mnobile browser in the US, compared to 57% in Europe. SMS services account for 24% in Europe and 23% in the US. [Press release]