Vodafone this week announced its formal 3G launch to great fanfare, with new handsets, services and pricing. This brief note gives our view on the launch and likely impact in Europe and Japan.

This report looks at the prospects for mobile operators. It focuses on the UK, and Vodafone in particular, because of the high quality of data available to analysts. We think the main conclusions apply widely across European operators.

It is well placed to weather any downturn, though its dependence on recruitment advertising continues to concern outside observers.