Handsets

ROME—The market for messaging services continues to lead the development of the worldwide wireless data industry, as shown by several news announcements. First, the GSM Association released figures showing the …

RESTON, Va.—Nextel Communications Inc. and Motorola Inc. reported the successful testing of voice coder software designed to nearly double Nextel’s wireless voice capacity, and they said Motorola will deliver a …

REDWOOD CITY, Calif.—Openwave Systems Inc. said it plans to perform a testing program to confirm if its MMS Client, MMS server and its WAP Gateway interoperates with Nokia’s MMS-enabled handsets …

TOKYO—Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications, a joint venture of Sony and Ericsson, is going to set up a subsidiary in China for producing third-generation (3G) handsets, Nikkei Shimbun reported on 8 …

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HELSINKI, Finland—Norwegian telecom operator Telenor’s competitors in Scandinavia are puzzled by the Oslo-based operator’s decision to price at the high end for multimedia messaging services (MMS). Telenor intends to charge …

BEIJING—Following a three-month trial period, China Unicom launched commercial services on its CDMA network on 8 April. The trial period went less smoothly than the company had hoped, as it …

KANSAS CITY, Mo.—Sprint PCS launched its Project Connect nationwide phone collection and recycling campaign benefiting Easter Seals and the National Organization on Disability. Wireless users are being asked to donate …

TOKYO—NTT DoCoMo Inc. said has begun to concentrate on profits instead of sales following reports the wireless company will fall short of its originally forecasted subscribers additions to its recently …

ORLANDO, Florida, United States—Following on a meeting of operators and vendors with an interest in Enhanced Data Rates for Global Evolution (EDGE) technology at the 3GSM World Congress in France …

NEW DELHI, India—Handset manufacturers worried about the disturbing trend of low sales in European and U.S. markets can take comfort from emerging trends in the Asia-Pacific region. All research findings …

HAUPPAUGE, N.Y.-Problems with Qualcomm Inc. CDMA chipsets and delays in carrier approvals of new handsets led to a disappointing first fiscal quarter for Audiovox Corp. The company reported net sales …

OXFORD, United Kingdom—Mobile phones should be equipped with satellite tracking and theft alarms, according to the U.K.-based Design Council. The organization claimed that if cell-phone manufacturers adopt these two examples, …

BEIJING—China Unicom’s CDMA network registered 448,000 subscribers at the end of February. Only a paltry 9,000 users signed up in February. The vast majority of CDMA users were transferred from …

NEW DELHI, India—The Thai government on 19 March gave formal approval to the state-owned Telephone Organization of Thailand (TOT) to go ahead with a soft launch of its new GSM …

TOKYO—J-Phone, Vodafone Group’s carrier in Japan, announced that the number of users of J-Phone’s popular mobile photo service exceeded 4 million. J-Phone launched the service with handsets that include built-in …

ORLANDO—AT&T Wireless made several announcements to bolster its presence at CTIA Wireless 2002. The carrier announced it will install Adaptive Multirate Vocorder (AMR) technology that could more than double the …

HAMAMATSU CITY, Shizuoka—Yamaha Corp. announced it will provide a 16-note polyphonic cellular ring tone download service to German carrier E-Plus Mobilfunk GmbH & Co. KG—coinciding with E-Plus’s launch of i-mode …

NEW YORK—Moody’s Investors Service Inc. has downgraded the debt of Brightpoint Inc., Indianapolis, citing the “recent decline in profitability” of the company and the “uncertainty associated with growth in the …

SAN DIEGO, United States—Qualcomm signed an agreement with Japanese carrier KDDI to enable the carrier’s handsets with Qualcomm’s Binary Runtime Environment for Wireless (BREW) technology to enhance KDDI’s data services …

OXFORD, United Kingdom—Having heard that T-Mobile plans to launch third-generation (3G) services in 20 German cities during the third quarter, Vodafone D2 responded this week by announcing plans for a …

OXFORD, United Kingdom—Despite upbeat statements from equipment manufacturers and the organizers, this year’s CeBIT exhibition would seem to have been hit with bad news, particularly for the cell-phone industry, together …

TOKYO—Mitsubishi Electric and Toshiba, two leading electronic manufacturers in Japan, partnered for third-generation (3G) handsets and will begin collaborating next month on the development of a new platform for multimedia-enabled, …

SAN JOSE, California, United States—For the first time in its history, the mobile-phone industry experienced a drop in unit sales in 2001, according to Dataquest. Worldwide mobile-phone sales totaled nearly …

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