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With 16 exclusive mobile phones including the new BlackBerry Storm for contract customers, Text Unlimited for all pay as you talk customers, and the Dell Inspiron Mini 9 ‘netbook’ with built-in mobile broadband, Vodafone UK will have something for everyone this Christmas.

From the great value £30 pay as you talk Vodafone 527 Rainbow with its range of colours for the fashion conscious, to the latest Sony Ericsson C905 with its 8.1 mega pixel camera, all Vodafone’s Yuletide offerings will make the most of its fast and reliable network.

Ian Shepherd, consumer director for Vodafone UK, says: “This year’s Christmas range features a great mix of phones at a price that will please everyone. Many of our exclusive mobiles will make ideal gifts especially as several will come with a free digital photo frame. There really is something for everyone from a stylish low cost mobile in the shape of the VF527 Rainbow to more sophisticated mobiles for avid internet, social network, instant messaging and email users.

“Of course there’s also plenty of choice for those who want to have their music in their pocket or quick access to satellite navigation with the Sony Ericsson W350i and the Nokia 6210. Best of all, every Vodafone Pay as you talk customer can opt into Text Unlimited to be rewarded with free texts each month just for topping up £5 or more. As Vodafone is the only network operator to reward topping up just £5, this all makes a mobile from Vodafone’s Pay as you talk range a perfect gift for Christmas.”

Pay as you talk: Not only will Vodafone have twelve exclusive mobiles for Pay as you talk (PAYT) customers to choose from, there will also be a highly desirable free gift of a digital photo frame (RRP £50)* with purchases of the Samsung G600, Nokia 6500 Classic or the Sony Ericsson K770i. All Vodafone PAYT customers can get even more value with free rewards of unlimited texts when they opt in to Vodafone’s Text Unlimited plan. Free to join, Text Unlimited is activated by spending as little as a £5 on top up each month**. Customers can earn extra texts each month from unlimited weekday evening texts through to free texts all month by just topping up.

For our contract customers there is a wide selection of smart phones and camera phones, all of which are available from free on monthly price plans that all include unlimited email and internet*** use.
PAYT:

Sony Ericsson K770i – exclusive in pink or silver – cyber-shot camera phone, £80 when bought with £20 Top Up

Sony Ericsson W350 - exclusive black and purple colourway - a great music clamshell, £60

Sony Ericsson W910i Havana Gold – exclusive – with its Walkman media player it’s ideal for music lovers, £100

Samsung Steel – exclusive - 3 mega pixel (MP) camera phone with auto-focus and video capture, £80 (also available on contract)

Samsung J700 – exclusive in silver and pink – stylish and desirable slider phone, £50

Samsung G600 – available in pink and graphite high quality 5MP camera phone, £100

Samsung Omnia – Stylish Windows Mobile device with a 5MP camera and full touch-screen making it great for mobile internet, £400 (and from free on contract)

Nokia 6500 classic - Premium design with a 2MP camera, 1GB internal memory and 3G making it great for fast downloads and web browsing, £100

Vodafone’s own range of mobiles completes the pay as you talk line up with the VF527 Rainbow in a variety of bright stylish colours (£30 inc £10 Airtime), the great value, VF725 2MP camera phone (£50 and the new additions to the range), the VF533 1.3 MP camera slider (£30 when bought with £10 Top Up), and the compact and lightweight VF231 (£20).

CONTRACT:

BlackBerry Storm 9500 – a highly desirable multi-media smartphone purpose built for Vodafone customers

Nokia 6210 – exclusive – 3.2 MP camera, ideal for sat nav, email and internet

Nokia N96 16GB – 5MP camera, ideal for email and internet and for storing photos, videos and music with its 16GB memory

Nokia 6124 Classic – Classic 2MP camera phone, great for email and internet

Sony Ericsson 595 Walkman - exclusive in black and red - this stylish music slider phone comes with stereo sound, shake control, MegaBass™ and an AM/FM Radio. Great for fast internet too.

Sony Ericsson C905 – the most advanced Cyber-shot camera slider phone yet with an 8.1 megapixel camera and real flash

Sony Ericsson Xperia – stylish Windows Mobile device, QWERTY slide-out keyboard, 3″ colour touch-screen and fast internet browsing

Mobile Broadband: The Dell Inspiron Mini 9 with mobile broadband built in is the latest exclusive addition to Vodafone’s family of mobile broadband products. Complete with a Vodafone SIM, and pre-installed mobile broadband connectivity software, the Mini 9 eliminates the need to use an additional USB modem to connect to the web. Available from free on a 24 month price plan, customers can connect to the UK’s fastest and most reliable mobile broadband network anytime, anywhere.

Vodafone also has a great accessory pack to complement the netbook including an 8GB memory flash drive, a netbook ‘skin’ in black with red stitching and a cleaning kit for just £25.
Vodafone’s Christmas campaign launches on Television later this month 17th November and will be supported by outdoor, press and online advertising.

The highly anticipated Blackberry Storm 9500, the first ever touch-screen BlackBerry smartphone, purpose built exclusively for Vodafone, will be available to buy from 14th November. Available on a range of high value price-plans, the device offers consumers and business customers easy access to voice and email, a range of social media applications, multimedia content, satellite navigation and many other services on the move.

Customers who want to be the first in the UK to have a BlackBerry Storm can pre-order in Vodafone stores, online at www.vodafone.co.uk/storm and telesales, and account managers for our business customers from November 14. It will also be available for sale through Vodafone’s retail partner Phones 4U in store and online.

“We know customers are excited about the Storm and the early pre-orders really emphasise this. We continue to take orders and are excited that customers are responding so enthusiastically,” commented Ian Shepherd, consumer director, Vodafone UK. “Our customers told us that they wanted a single phone that would give them the most secure, reliable email and messaging experience possible combined with all the desirable smartphone features, and at a price that’s affordable. The BlackBerry Storm has delivered all of this and more and will give our customers incredible power in their hands to make the most of now.”

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The U.S. might have a week to get comfortable with their T-mobile G1’s before the UK, but T-mobile UK definitely has the price advantage. According to TechDigest, the G1 will be available for free on 40 EUR a month plans with a couple different packages. While many of us will be ponying up the $299 online price since we are ineligible for a 2 year upgrade, even the 2 year first-time activations and renewals will be spending $179 in the states.

There are currently 25,000 registered G1 hopefuls with T-mobile UK, but now with the option to pick up the device for free on certain plans we expect this number to grow rapidly.  As we’ve mentioned in the past, the black and white models of the G1 will be available at launch in the UK and will come with a pre-installed 2GB microSD memory card.  It is time to set your clock as the countdown for the T-mobile UK G1 launch has officially kicked off.

Via TechDigest

The rumors that Orange UK would be pulling the BlackBerry Bold off shelves now seem a bit more real thanks to an internal memo leak this afternoon.  According to the memo, the BlackBerry Bold has seen reports of software issues across various mobile operators and Orange UK is taking the necessary steps to stop the madness.  All shipments of the device in the UK by Orange will now be suspended until they receive feedback from RIM.  I guess At&t’s BlackBerry Bold delays are a little bit of a relief despite the agonizing wait.

“Following reports of software issues with the BlackBerry Bold handset across a variety of mobile operators, Orange has decided to act in the interest of its customers by suspending shipments of the device in the UK. We are currently awaiting feed back from RIM as to when an industry wide fix for these issues will be in place, and expect this suspension to be an interim measure.We apologise for any inconvenience this issue may cause you.”
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From today, Vodafone UK customers will be the first to be able to sample and download bestselling titles as they come to market direct to their mobiles.  Using GoSpoken.com, they can keep up with their favorite authors on the go by downloading audio or in the next two weeks ebook versions of the latest blockbusters or ordering the traditional book itself. Vodafone UK customers will also have the opportunity to discover new authors by browsing an extensive catalog and sampling chapters in audio and text.

“We’re very excited to bring UK’s bestselling authors to mobiles,” says Mike Eaton, Head of Content at Vodafone UK. “Our customers want simplicity and services that are easy to select, buy and use. Today with our new price plans Vodafone customers have the confidence to browse the internet on mobile for as long as they need with no extra costs when sampling or downloading the latest book releases. “

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Mark your calendars ladies and gents, the 8 megapixel LG KC910 Renoir is making its debut in the UK on October 15th.  According to Phones4You and Dialaphone the successor to the LG Viewty will be available next Wednesday to start the new era in LG flagship devices.  As we’ve mentioned numerous times in the past, the Renoir is only 14mm thick but has 8-megapixel camera with Xenon flash, Schneider-Kreuznach and, geo tagging and lots of other features. Video can be captured in VGA resolution at 30fps or in QVGA at up to 120fps for slow motion effect. It is the first LG for the global market with Dolby sound for better music and video sound. For video playback, it features both DivX and XviD and the TV-out allows for previewing on a large screen. It is quad-band GSM with HSDPA 7.2 Mbps and WiFi support.

Via Phones4You and Dialaphone

Sony Ericsson has announced that they will be closing its only UK flagship retail store by the end of this year after failing to turn a profit.  The flagship store is based in London’s posh Kensington area and after a launch back in late 2006, the joint venture with Carphone warehouse is coming to a close.  According to UK trade magazine, Mobile Today, Sony Ericsson has also ruled out opening any more stores in Western Europe in the foreseeable future and instead focus on adding to its 200 existing stores in the Asian market.

Lianne Norry, VP for retail marketing at Sony Ericsson, told the magazine,

“The market conditions in western Europe don’t make it appropriate for us to open stores here.” She added that “the dominance of big multiple chains and operator stores in the UK market contributed to make it difficult for Sony Ericsson’s direct retail ambitions in the UK.”

Prospective UK T-mobile G1 buyers might be frustrated with the following bit of information.  According to  T-mobile UK’s website, the G1 will be capped at 3GB of data transfer per month, at which time you will get a call from a T-mobile representative to suggest that you upgrade your account.  Officially T-mobile has released the following statement:

“If you exceed that you won’t be charged initially but if you continue the heavy usage you may get a charge from a T-Mobile representative suggesting that you upgrade your account.”

In the U.S., after initially setting a 1GB soft limit, T-mobile USA decided to change plans and remove the cap entirely.  With the big competitor to T-mobile G1 being the iPhone 3G, the lack of data capping by At&t has forced T-mobile to follow suit.  It will be interesting how T-mobile USA and T-mobile UK actually carry out these data cap policies, but if they decide to enforce them remember that we warned you.

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Despite being exclusive to one carrier in the UK (O2), the Apple iPhone has already achieved between 4 and 6 percent of the UK handset market share.  According to UK trade magazine, Mobile Today, Apple is still selling around 27,000 iPhones per week, down from the 50,000 per week at launch.

The magazine also suggested that since O2 is the exclusive iPhone carrier in the UK, the pressure to sell is forcing large orders as it tries to retain the UK exclusivity.  With a Christmas season just around the corner and the prepay options opening up for the carrier it looks like we might see the numbers return to launch week very soon. Continue reading