The Nokia Comes With Music (CWM) service bundles a music-centric handset with an unlimited music downloads service, allowing consumers to easily take advantage of their handsets’ music functionality, and have no need for a separate iPod

Distribution connection numbers were strong (+9%), especially on contract (+21%), despite a reduction in store expansion and the consumer slowdown which is affecting other consumer electronics businesses

The long awaited first Android-driven handset was launched this week, and with the Google logo emblazoned on the back it has been swiftly christened the Googlephone

European revenue growth fell to 1.4% in the quarter, down 0.8ppts from 2.2% last quarter, driven primarily by Spain where growth fell 4.1ppts. The deterioration was despite an improvement in the regulatory conditions, and underlying growth fell by 1.0ppts, with Italy slowing rapidly

H3G Group’s H1 2008 results showed static revenue and EBITDA slipping back into negative territory, neither of which bode well for the company’s target of being EBIT positive next year

Carphone Warehouse had a solid quarter on the distribution side given the current environment, with 6-7% underlying organic retail growth and roughly stable like-for-like figures

Vodafone Europe’s service revenue growth dropped by two full percentage points in the quarter to June 2008; Spain plummeted from +5.1% to -2.5%, but the UK and Italy’s underlying growth also fell, with only Germany stable

In our view the potential for synergies from an acquisition of Thus by C&W, though more limited than might be supposed, would still have a significant impact on the combined entity at the EBITDA level

European revenue growth improved by a whole percentage point this quarter, jumping to 2.2% from 1.2% last quarter. Most of this (0.7 percentage points) was due to a reduced regulatory impact, and this should continue to improve throughout this year, with the impact due to drop from about 4% to less than 1% by early next year

The much anticipated iPhone 3G is due to launch in July; it will include 3G and GPS, but will otherwise be quite similar to the old model, and is still a little off-the-pace in feature terms