Mobile phone firm launches handset for four-year-olds.

"It's small, blue and more likely to end up in children's mouths than in their hands where it belongs. This week a British company launched a teddy-bear shaped mobile phone for four-year-olds."

Ed Zander on Motorola's tech turnaround.

"Asked what keeps him awake at night, Zander said just keeping track of all the industry currents and trends, and figuring out what they mean for his company. The industry, he noted, is not only consolidating?he spoke at HBS just after the closing of Sprint's acquisition of Nextel?but it is also converging through communications, computing, and entertainment. 'The question is, am I moving fast enough to understand the convergence points? Are we lean enough, fast enough?'"

Insignia Solutions changes symbol, names CFO.

"Insignia Solutions began trading Friday on the Nasdaq under the symbol 'INSGE,' a change necessitated by the company's failure to file its third-quarter report with the Securities and Exchange Commission... Also Friday, the company announced that John Davis will join the company on Dec. 8 as chief financial officer. He had been CFO at Redwood Shores-based Wherify Wireless Inc."

BT dials up free mobile phone calls service.

"BT is to take on leading mobile phone operators such as Vodafone and O2 by enabling customers to make free calls on their mobiles."

Did Lenovo buy IBM's laptop business to sell phones?

"Lenovo said they intend to expand their mobile phone business, and have doubled sales over last year. We expect they will take this success to the export market. It's no secret that Western carriers are reticent to purchase Chinese handsets from the likes of Ningpo Bird, ZTE, etc because of fears of lower quality or culture/communication challenges. But Lenovo can now say, 'We understand Western business. You can trust our quality. We're the people who sell the Thinkpad.'"

Mobile phones fight poverty.

"Says Grameen Phone founder Muhammad Yunus, 'When you get a mobile phone it is almost like having a card to get out of poverty in a couple of years.'"

Insignia Solutions engages strategic advisor.

"Insignia Solutions today announced that it has engaged SVB Alliant, the investment banking arm of Silicon Valley Bank, to assist the Company as it considers strategic opportunities in the arenas of acquisitions and mergers to best leverage opportunities in over-the-air device management solutions."

also see: Insignia Solutions Q3 revenue expected up

Red Bend Software demonstrates interoperability of Its OMA DM Client.

"Red Bend Software... today announced that it successfully tested its OMA DM client with device management servers from several vendors, including mFormation and Synchronica."

Insignia Solutions joins industry leaders in Forum Nokia PRO.

"Insignia Solutions, a leading mobile device management solutions provider, today announced that it has become a member of Forum Nokia PRO... Forum Nokia PRO is a program that provides advanced technical, business development and marketing support to selected mobile software companies. As a member of Forum Nokia PRO, Insignia has the opportunity to further strengthen its relationship with Nokia, gain early access to Nokia technology and take advantage of specialized services and support provided by Nokia to help Insignia stand out in the marketplace. "

Alltel to buy Midwest Wireless.

"Alltel today announced an agreement to purchase Midwest Wireless for just over $1 billion. Alltel expects to gain approximately 400,000 wireless customers in southern Minnesota, northern and eastern Iowa, and western Wisconsin."

also see: US Carrier Consolidation Continues

Google opens London GooglePlex for mobile push.

"Google has officially unveiled its London GooglePlex, promising it will milk the capital for its wireless know-how... The team will target its wireless efforts 'more toward taking applications and making them available on mobile', Arora said. 'Mobile is definitely coming of age - an interesting phase has arrived.'"

Opera's AJAX phone browser excites mobile web developers.

"Opera Software's release (OPERA) of its Opera Platform SDK gives developers a way to create broader mobile web applications, such as an email client, a game, or a stock ticker using platform independent applications, based on well known Web technologies such as HTML, CSS and JavaScript. The combination of these technologies is popularly referred to as AJAX."

Sony launches free Internet phone service.

"The electronics giant launched a free Web-based phone service on Wednesday called Instant Video Everywhere, designed to link users of the service via their computers. According to an advertisement on Sony's Web site, the new service will ship with the company's latest version of Vaio BX laptops, which are equipped with built-in video cameras."

New mobile Linux group launches.

"A group of companies launched the Linux Phone Standards (LiPS) Forum on Monday. It's the newest effort to create standards aimed at fostering the use of Linux on mobile devices."

CA offers peek at Smart Phone Manager, wireless developments.

"The new Smart Phone Manager Server can gather information on devices such as who owns the device, what it is, how it communicates, which network it is registered on and which department it belongs to. The server can also apply security policies to the device."

The virtual cell phone.

"The solution is to have an enterprise-provisioned and ?managed handset. But does that mean we?ll all have to carry two phones ? one business, and one personal? Nope. The solution is to have a 'virtual' cell phone, essentially a second personality with its own number and associated personal information, living within the enterprise phone. This side of the phone would be paid for by the employee, and distinctive ringing would tell you which phone is in use. Zapping or otherwise configuring or managing the enterprise personality wouldn?t affect the personal side. Leave the company? Keep the phone, but half of it is now useless, and all that proprietary data (and access to the enterprise networks) is gone. I?m told Motorola and Nokia are working on this. "

The future of convergence is not mobile.

"A UK survey predicts that media hungry consumers will favour the home computer over the mobile phone in the quest for a digital lifestyle."

Nokia pays $430m for email intellisync.

"...to add e-mail software in its handsets and compete with the BlackBerry device."

Forrester Research: IMS will transform telecom.

"Vendors and carriers herald the IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) network architecture as the trigger for the next telecom boom... IMS is over-hyped today ? with immature standards and no way to prove product interoperability ? but will deliver on its promise by 2009. While the IMS architecture lets the network operator control applications and content initially, the open technologies used by IMS will ultimately enable application providers to bypass carrier controls and exploit the underlying network."

Start-up aims to join telephone, wireless calls.

"Stoke's software helps manage incoming calls and determine the most efficient way to route the call onto local networks. A mobile phone call could be connected via a Wi-Fi connection, a cable broadband link or a citywide wireless WiMax network."

Skype closer to being blocked in China.

"Verso is on the verge of announcing a contract win to block Skype for a major Chinese telecom outfit. Not that the deal to buy Skype ever seemed to make much sense, but it's about to make even less sense."

As mobile workforce grows, IT support could lag.

"Computerworld reports that according to IDC the 'global mobile workforce is expected to grow by more than 20 percent in the next four years, with 878 million mobile workers toiling away on laptops, handhelds and cell phones by 2009.' However IDC warns that as the numbers grow, IT might not be ready to support it."

Carriers adopt content rating for cellphones.

"The nation's major cellular phone carriers said yesterday that they had adopted a content rating system for video, music, pictures and games that they sell to cellphone users, reports the NY Times."

Low-power wireless broadband.

"Could a wireless network be built with inexpensive access points that have a range of miles instead of feet, and that can run on long-lasting watch batteries? xG Technology is developing hardware for such a network, which is currently being piloted in Miami."

Yahoo! to launch co-branded phone with SBC.

"Yahoo Inc. and Google Inc. are set to roll out new wireless services, taking advantage of advanced networks and cellphones to provide features similar to those available on computers, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday."

The second coming of Microsoft Mobile.

"While Microsoft's mobile group is still by far its smallest division, after years of fits and starts, the future finally looks bright. 'It's pretty clear that phones represent arguably the biggest electronics market in the world,' Starkweather says, 'so all of a sudden every division in the company is knocking on our door.' Though he won't say what the group is cooking up, it's finally worth paying attention to see what it will do next."

Internet phone calls on the rise.

"A third of people in the US and Europe will abandon phone lines in favour of wireless and broadband telephony come 2009, say analysts Gartner."

Om Malik: Microsoft gets VoIP serious.

"Microsoft is getting very very serious about VoIP. The company just announced that it is buying media-streams.com AG, a unified messaging software company based in Zurich, Switzerland. The acquisition of media-streams.com AG will allow Microsoft to tightly integrate VoIP with its Office System applications and servers—specifically its Real-Time Collaboration platform, Microsoft Office Live Communications Server."

Sprint, cable companies make it official.

"Sprint, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Cox Communications and Advance/Newhouse are forming a joint venture to meld the companies' wired and wireless services. Much of the talk has been about how cable companies want to offer the 'quadruple play' -- cable TV, internet, voice and mobile phone... Customers will buy the bundled services from one company and have just a single point of contact, but the JV says it will give users access to all their services -- even DVR content -- from the mobile device. It's that kind of integration, not just bundling, that makes things far more exciting than just having everything on a single bill for consumers."

Nvidia CEO unveils VoIP vision.

"The future of wireless communications could be a world without mobile phones, where Wi-Fi signals pick up your voice commands from a chip-enabled lapel on your breast pocket, then VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) converts the voice signals to data and sends them across the Internet to powerful servers that can identify the caller's voice and connect them immediately to the person they're trying to find."

Nokia launches open-source browser.

"Nokia on Wednesday said its open-source mobile Web browser is now available. It also launched a new portal to share information about its open-source activities."

Nokia achieves convergence milestone.

"As a significant milestone in its fixed-mobile convergence strategy, Nokia has completed both voice and data calls with Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA) technology in a Nokia Solutions Experience Center in the United States.

UMA, a 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Program) standard, is an access technology that allows seamless handover of mobile voice and data from a cellular network to a wireless local area network (WLAN/WiFi). The UMA standard defines how mobile operators can turn home, office and public WLANs into seamless extensions of their cellular networks. With UMA, operators can deliver voice and data services to subscribers over the WiFi access networks, dramatically increasing mobile service usage while decreasing costs of network deployment. "

Windows Live - more than an AJAX desktop.

"Windows Live is a free, ad-supported AJAX virtual desktop... Microsoft has added plenty of new features that add a lot of value to the product. Among them are email integration, a new instant messaging client, plaxo-like contact management and skype-like features that allow outgoing calls to normal POTS phones. "

Tom McMahon visually summarizes AT&T history.