Mobile phone
Encyclopedia
A mobile phone is a device which can make and receive telephone call
s over a radio link
whilst moving around a wide geographic area. It does so by connecting to a cellular network
provided by a mobile network operator
. The calls are to and from the public telephone network which includes other mobiles and fixed-line phones across the world. By contrast, a cordless telephone
is used only within the short range of a single, private base station.
In addition to telephony, modern mobile phones also support a wide variety of other services
such as text messaging
, MMS
, email, Internet access, short-range wireless communications (infrared, Bluetooth
), business applications, gaming and photography. Mobile phones that offer these and more general computing capabilities are referred to as smartphone
s.
The first hand-held mobile phone was demonstrated by Dr Martin Cooper of Motorola
in 1973, using a handset weighing 2 1/2 lbs (about 1 kg). In 1983, the DynaTAC 8000x
was the first to be commercially available. In the twenty years from 1990 to 2010, worldwide mobile phone subscriptions grew from 12.4 million to over 4.6 billion, penetrating the developing economies
and reaching the bottom of the economic pyramid
.
's invention and shore-to-ship demonstration of radio telephony, through the Second World War with military use of radio telephony links and civil services in the 1950s.
The first mobile telephone call made from a car occurred in St. Louis, Missouri
, USA on June 17, 1946, using the Bell System
's Mobile Telephone Service
. The equipment weighed 80 pounds (36.3 kg), and the AT&T
service, basically a massive party line, cost US$30 per month (equal to $ today) plus 30–40 cents per local call, equal to $ to $ today.
In 1956, the world’s first partly automatic car phone system, Mobile System A (MTA), was launched in Sweden. MTA phones were composed of vacuum tube
s and relay
s, and had a weight of 40 kg. In 1962, a more modern version called Mobile System B (MTB) was launched, which was a push-button telephone
, and which used transistors to enhance the telephone’s calling capacity and improve its operational reliability, thereby reducing the weight of the apparatus to 10 kg. In 1971, the MTD
version was launched, opening for several different brands of equipment and gaining commercial success.
Martin Cooper, a Motorola
researcher and executive is considered to be the inventor of the first practical mobile phone for handheld use in a non-vehicle setting, after a long race against Bell Labs
for the first portable mobile phone. Using a modern, if somewhat heavy portable handset, Cooper made the first call on a handheld mobile phone on April 3, 1973 to his rival, Dr. Joel S. Engel
of Bell Labs
.
The first commercially automated cellular network (the 1G
) was launched in Japan by NTT
in 1979, initially in the metropolitan area of Tokyo. Within five years, the NTT network had been expanded to cover the whole population of Japan and became the first nationwide 1G network. In 1981, this was followed by the simultaneous launch of the Nordic Mobile Telephone
(NMT) system in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. NMT was the first mobile phone network featuring international roaming
. The first 1G network launched in the USA was Chicago-based Ameritech
in 1983 using the Motorola DynaTAC
mobile phone. Several countries then followed in the early-to-mid 1980s including the UK, Mexico and Canada.
The first "modern" network technology on digital 2G
(second generation) cellular technology was launched by Radiolinja
(now part of Elisa Group
) in 1991 in Finland on the GSM standard, which also marked the introduction of competition in mobile telecoms when Radiolinja challenged incumbent Telecom Finland (now part of TeliaSonera
) who ran a 1G NMT network.
In 2001, the launch of 3G
(Third Generation) was again in Japan by NTT DoCoMo
on the WCDMA standard.
One of the newest 3G technologies to be implemented is High-Speed Downlink Packet Access
(HSDPA). It is an enhanced 3G
(third generation) mobile telephony
communications protocol
in the high-speed packet access (HSPA) family, also coined 3.5G, 3G+ or turbo 3G, which allows networks based on Universal Mobile Telecommunications System
(UMTS) to have higher data transfer speeds and capacity.
All mobile phones have a number of features in common, but manufacturers also try to differentiate their own products by implementing additional functions to make them more attractive to consumers. This has led to great innovation in mobile phone development over the past 20 years.
The common components found on all phones are:
Low-end mobile phones are often referred to as feature phone
s, and offer basic telephony, as well as functions such as playing music and taking photos, and sometimes simple applications based on generic managed
platforms such as Java ME or BREW. Handsets with more advanced computing ability through the use of native software applications became known as smartphone
s. The first smartphone was the Nokia 9000 Communicator in 1996 which added PDA
functionality to the basic mobile phone at the time. As miniaturization and increased processing power of microchips has enabled ever more features to be added to phones, the concept of the smartphone has evolved, and what was a high-end smartphone five years ago, is a standard phone today.
Several phone series have been introduced to address a given market segment, such as the RIM BlackBerry
focusing on enterprise/corporate customer email needs; the SonyEricsson Walkman series of musicphones and Cybershot series of cameraphones; the Nokia Nseries
of multimedia phones, the Palm Pre
the HTC Dream
and the Apple iPhone
.
Other features that may be found on mobile phones include GPS navigation, music (MP3) and video (MP4) playback, RDS
radio receiver, alarms, memo recording, personal digital assistant
functions, ability to watch streaming video, video download, video calling, built-in cameras (1.0+ Mpx
) and camcorder
s (video recording), with autofocus
and flash, ringtones, games, PTT
, memory card reader
(SD), USB (2.0), dual line support, infrared
, Bluetooth
(2.0) and WiFi
connectivity, instant messaging
, Internet e-mail and browsing
and serving as a wireless modem
. Nokia
and the University of Cambridge demonstrated a bendable cell phone called the Morph
. Some phones can make mobile payment
s via direct mobile billing schemes or through contactless payment
s if the phone and point of sale
support Near Field Communication
(NFC). Some of the largest mobile phone manufacturers and network providers along with many retail merchants support, or plan to support, contactless payments through NFC-equipped mobile phones.
Some phones have an electromechanical transducer
on the back which changes the electrical voice signal into mechanical vibrations. The vibrations flow through the cheek bones or forehead allowing the user to hear the conversation. This is useful in the noisy situations or if the user is hard of hearing.
The most commonly used data application on mobile phones is SMS
text messaging. The first SMS text message was sent from a computer to a mobile phone in 1992 in the UK, while the first person-to-person SMS from phone to phone was sent in Finland in 1993.
Other non-SMS data services used on mobile phones include mobile music, downloadable logos and pictures, gaming, gambling, adult entertainment and advertising. The first downloadable mobile content was sold to a mobile phone in Finland in 1998, when Radiolinja (now Elisa) introduced the downloadable ringtone service. In 1999, Japanese mobile operator NTT DoCoMo introduced its mobile Internet service, i-Mode
, which today is the world's largest mobile Internet service.
The first mobile news service, delivered via SMS, was launched in Finland in 2000. Mobile news
services are expanding with many organizations providing "on-demand" news services by SMS. Some also provide "instant" news pushed out by SMS.
Mobile payments were first trialled in Finland in 1998 when two Coca-Cola vending machines in Espoo were enabled to work with SMS payments. Eventually, the idea spread and in 1999 the Philippines launched the first commercial mobile payments systems, on the mobile operators Globe and Smart. Today, mobile payments ranging from mobile banking
to mobile credit cards to mobile commerce are very widely used in Asia and Africa, and in selected European markets.
Mobile phones generally obtain power from rechargeable
batteries. There are a variety of ways used to charge cell phones, including USB, portable batteries, mains power (using an AC adapter
), cigarette lighters (using an adapter), or a dynamo. In 2009, the first wireless charger was released for consumer use.
Various initiatives, such as the EU Common External Power Supply
have been announced to standardize the interface to the charger, and to promote energy efficiency of mains-operated chargers. A star rating system is promoted by some manufacturers, where the most efficient chargers consume less than 0.03 watts and obtain a five-star rating.
Battery
A popular early mobile phone battery was the nickel metal-hydride (NiMH) type, due to its relatively small size and low weight. Lithium ion
batteries are also used, as they are lighter and do not have the Voltage depression due to long-term over-charging that nickel metal-hydride batteries do. Many mobile phone manufacturers use lithium–polymer batteries as opposed to the older Lithium-Ion, the main advantages being even lower weight and the possibility to make the battery a shape other than strict cuboid. Mobile phone manufacturers have been experimenting with alternative power sources, including solar cell
s.
GSM mobile phones require a small microchip
called a Subscriber Identity Module or SIM Card, to function. The SIM card is approximately the size of a small postage stamp and is usually placed underneath the battery in the rear of the unit. The SIM securely stores the service-subscriber key (IMSI)
used to identify a subscriber on mobile telephony devices (such as mobile phones and computers). The SIM card allows users to change phones by simply removing the SIM card from one mobile phone and inserting it into another mobile phone or broadband telephony device.
A SIM card contains its unique serial number, internationally unique number of the mobile user (IMSI), security authentication and ciphering information, temporary information related to the local network, a list of the services the user has access to and two passwords (PIN for usual use and PUK for unlocking).
SIM cards are available in three standard sizes. The first is the size of a credit card (85.60 mm × 53.98 mm x 0.76 mm, defined by ISO/IEC 7810 as ID-1). The newer, most popular miniature version has the same thickness but a length of 25 mm and a width of 15 mm (ISO/IEC 7810 ID-000), and has one of its corners truncated (chamfered) to prevent misinsertion. The newest incarnation known as the 3FF or micro-SIM has dimensions of 15 mm × 12 mm. Most cards of the two smaller sizes are supplied as a full-sized card with the smaller card held in place by a few plastic links; it can easily be broken off to be used in a device that uses the smaller SIM.
The first SIM card was made in 1991 by Munich smart card maker Giesecke & Devrient
for the Finnish wireless network operator Radiolinja
. Giesecke & Devrient sold the first 300 SIM cards to Elisa (ex. Radiolinja).
Those cell phones that do not use a SIM Card have the data programmed in to their memory. This data is accessed by using a special digit sequence to access the "NAM" as in "Name" or number programming menu. From there, information can be added, including a new number for the phone, new Service Provider numbers, new emergency numbers, new Authentication Key or A-Key code, and a Preferred Roaming List or PRL. However, to prevent the phone being accidentally disabled or removed from the network, the Service Provider typically locks this data with a Master Subsidiary Lock (MSL). The MSL also locks
the device to a particular carrier when it is sold as a loss leader
.
The MSL applies only to the SIM, so once the contract has expired, the MSL still applies to the SIM. The phone, however, is also initially locked by the manufacturer into the Service Provider's MSL. This lock may be disabled so that the phone can use other Service Providers' SIM cards. Most phones purchased outside the U.S. are unlocked phones because there are numerous Service Providers that are close to one another or have overlapping coverage. The cost to unlock a phone varies but is usually very cheap and is sometimes provided by independent phone vendors.
A similar module called a Removable User Identity Module or RUIM card is present in some CDMA networks, notably in China and Indonesia.
Multi-card hybrid phones
A hybrid mobile phone can take more than one SIM card, even of different types. The SIM and RUIM cards can be mixed together, and some phones also support three or four SIMs.
From 2010 onwards they became popular in India and Indonesia and other emerging markets, attributed to the desire to obtain the lowest on-net calling rate. In Q3 2011, Nokia
shipped 18 million of its low cost dual SIM phone range in an attempt to make up lost ground in the higher end smartphone market.
, some of which are also touch screens. The screen size varies greatly by model and is usually specified either as width and height in pixels or the diagonal measured in inch
es.
Some mobiles have more than one display, for example the Kyocera Echo
, an Android smartphone
with a dual 3.5 inch screen. The screens can also be combined into a single 4.7 inch tablet style computer
.
s (CPUs), similar to those in computers, but optimised to operate in low power environments.
Mobile CPU performance depends not only on the clock rate (generally given in multiples of hertz
) but also the memory hierarchy
also greatly affects overall performance. Because of these problems, the performance of mobile phone CPUs is often more appropriately given by scores derived from various standardized tests to measure the real effective performance in commonly used applications.
The world's largest individual mobile operator by subscribers is China Mobile
with over 500 million mobile phone subscribers. Over 50 mobile operators have over 10 million subscribers each, and over 150 mobile operators have at least one million subscribers by the end of 2009 (source wireless intelligence). In February 2010, there were 4.6 billion mobile phone subscribers, a number that is estimated to grow.
Prior to 2010, Nokia
was the market leader. However, during that year competition emerged in the Asia Pacific region with brands such as Micromax, Nexian
, and i-Mobile and chipped away at Nokia's market share. Android powered smartphones also gained momentum across the region at the expense of Nokia. In India
, their market share also dropped significantly to around 31 percent from 56 percent in the same period. Their share was displaced by Chinese and Indian vendors of low-end mobile phones.
In 2010 worldwide sales were 1.6 billion units, an increase of 31.8 percent from 2009. The top five manufacturers by market share were Nokia followed by Samsung, LG Electronics, ZTE and Apple. The last three replaced RIM, Sony Ericsson and Motorola who were previously among the top five list. Outside the top five a significant market share increase from 16.5 percent to 30.6 percent was achieved by many smaller and new brands.
In Q1 2011, Apple surpassed Nokia as the world's biggest handset vendor by revenue, as Nokia's market share dropped to 29 percent in Q1 2011, the lowest level since the late 1990s. In June 2011, Nokia announced lower expectations for sales and margin due to global competition in both low-and-high end markets.
By Q2 2011, worldwide sales grew 16.5 percent to 428.7 million units.
Other manufacturers outside the top five are Research In Motion Ltd.
(RIM), HTC Corporation, Motorola
, Huawei
, Sony Ericsson
. Smaller players include Audiovox
(now UTStarcom
), BenQ-Siemens
, CECT, Fujitsu
, Kyocera
, Mitsubishi Electric
, NEC, Panasonic, Palm, Pantech Wireless Inc.
, Philips
, Qualcomm Inc.
, Sagem
, Sanyo
, Sharp
, Sierra Wireless
, Just5
, SK Teletech, T&A Alcatel
, Trium
, Toshiba
, and Vidalco.
In 2006, the total value of mobile-phone-paid media content exceeded Internet-paid media content and was worth 31 billion dollars. The value of music on phones was worth 9.3 billion dollars in 2007 and gaming was worth over 5 billion dollars in 2007.
The advent of media on the mobile phone has also produced the opportunity to identify and track alpha users or hubs, the most influential members of any social community. AMF Ventures measured in 2007 the relative accuracy of three mass media, and found that audience measures on mobile were nine times more accurate than on the Internet and 90 times more accurate than on TV.
The mobile phone is often called the "fourth screen" (if counting cinema, TV and PC screens as the first three) or "third screen" (counting only TV and PC screens). It is also called the seventh of the mass media
(with print, recordings, cinema, radio, TV and internet the first six).
Mobile phone use while driving is common but controversial. Being distracted while operating a motor vehicle has been shown to increase the risk of accident. Because of this, many jurisdictions prohibit the use of mobile phones while driving. Egypt, Israel, Japan, Portugal and Singapore ban both handheld and hands-free use of a mobile phone; others —including the UK, France, and many U.S. states—ban handheld phone use only, allowing hands-free use.
Due to the increasing complexity of mobile phones, they are often more like mobile computers in their available uses. This has introduced additional difficulties for law enforcement officials in distinguishing one usage from another as drivers use their devices. This is more apparent in those countries which ban both handheld and hands-free usage, rather those who have banned handheld use only, as officials cannot easily tell which function of the mobile phone is being used simply by looking at the driver. This can lead to drivers being stopped for using their device illegally on a phone call when, in fact, they were using the device for a legal purpose such as the phone's incorporated controls for car stereo or satnav.
A recently published study has reviewed the incidence of mobile phone use while cycling and its effects on behaviour and safety.
to calculate the differences in time for a signal to travel from the cell phone to each of several cell towers near the owner of the phone.
The movements of a mobile phone user can be tracked by their service provider and, if desired, by law enforcement agencies and their government. Both the SIM card and the handset can be tracked.
China has proposed using this technology to track commuting patterns of Beijing city residents. In the UK and US, law enforcement and intelligence services use mobiles to perform surveillance. They possess technology to activate the microphones in cell phones remotely in order to listen to conversations that take place near to the person who holds the phone.
in the microwave
range, which some believe may be harmful to human health. A large body of research exists, both epidemiological
and experimental, in non-human animals
and in humans, of which the majority shows no definite causative relationship between exposure to mobile phones and harmful biological effects in humans. This is often paraphrased simply as the balance of evidence showing no harm to humans from mobile phones, although a significant number of individual studies do suggest such a relationship, or are inconclusive. Other digital wireless systems
, such as data communication networks, produce similar radiation.
On 31 May 2011, the World Health Organization
confirmed that mobile phone use may represent a long-term health risk, classifying mobile phone radiation as a "carcinogenic hazard" and "possibly carcinogenic to humans" after a team of scientists reviewed peer-review studies on cell phone safety. One study of past cell phone use cited in the report showed a "40% increased risk for gliomas (brain cancer) in the highest category of heavy users (reported average: 30 minutes per day over a 10‐year period)." This is a reversal from their prior position that cancer was unlikely to be caused by cellular phones or their base stations and that reviews had found no convincing evidence for other health effects. Certain countries, including France, have warned against the use of cell phones especially by minors due to health risk uncertainties.
At least some recent studies have found an association between cell phone use and certain kinds of brain and salivary gland tumors. Lennart Hardell and other authors of a 2009 meta-analysis of 11 studies from peer-reviewed journals concluded that cell phone usage for at least ten years “approximately doubles the risk of being diagnosed with a brain tumor on the same ('ipsilateral') side of the head as that preferred for cell phone use.”
In addition, a mobile phone can spread infectious disease
s by its frequent contact with hands. One study came to the result that pathogenic bacteria
are present on approximately 40% of mobile phones belonging to patients in a hospital, and on approximately 20% of mobile phones belonging to hospital staff.
with nominal data rates of 100 Mbit/s to fast moving devices, and 1 Gbit/s to stationary devices defined by the ITU-R
4G systems may be based on the 3GPP
LTE (Long Term Evolution) cellular standard, offering peak bit rates of 326.4 Mbit/s. It may perhaps also be based on WiMax
or Flash-OFDM wireless metropolitan area network technologies that promise broadband wireless access
with speeds that reaches 233 Mbit/s for mobile users. The radio interface in these systems is based on all-IP packet switching
, MIMO
diversity, multi-carrier modulation schemes, Dynamic Channel Assignment (DCA) and channel-dependent scheduling. A 4G system should be a complete replacement for current network infrastructure and is expected to be able to provide a comprehensive and secure IP solution where voice, data, and streamed multimedia can be given to users on a "Anytime, Anywhere" basis, and at much higher data rates than previous generations.
In March 2011, KT from South Korea announced that they has expanded its high-speed wireless broadband network by 4G
WiBro
cover 85 percent of the population. It is the largest broadband network covered in the world, followed by Japan and US with 70 percent and 36 percent respectively.
In early 2011, 4G mobile phones were released by Motorola
, HTC
and Samsung
.
Telephone call
A telephone call is a connection over a telephone network between the calling party and the called party.-Information transmission:A telephone call may carry ordinary voice transmission using a telephone, data transmission when the calling party and called party are using modems, or facsimile...
s over a radio link
Radio Link Protocol
Radio Link Protocol is an automatic repeat request fragmentation protocol used over a wireless air interface. Most wireless air interfaces are tuned to provide 1% packet loss, and most Vocoders are mutually tuned to sacrifice very little voice quality at 1% packet loss...
whilst moving around a wide geographic area. It does so by connecting to a cellular network
Cellular network
A cellular network is a radio network distributed over land areas called cells, each served by at least one fixed-location transceiver known as a cell site or base station. When joined together these cells provide radio coverage over a wide geographic area...
provided by a mobile network operator
Mobile network operator
A mobile network operator , also known as mobile phone operator , carrier service provider , wireless service provider, wireless carrier, or cellular company, or mobile network carrier is a telephone company that provides services for mobile phone subscribers.One essential...
. The calls are to and from the public telephone network which includes other mobiles and fixed-line phones across the world. By contrast, a cordless telephone
Cordless telephone
A cordless telephone or portable telephone is a telephone with a wireless handset that communicates via radio waves with a base station connected to a fixed telephone line, usually within a limited range of its base station...
is used only within the short range of a single, private base station.
In addition to telephony, modern mobile phones also support a wide variety of other services
GSM services
GSM services are a standard collection of applications and features available to mobile phone subscribers all over the world. The GSM standards are defined by the 3GPP collaboration and implemented in hardware and software by equipment manufacturers and mobile phone operators...
such as text messaging
Text messaging
Text messaging, or texting, refers to the exchange of brief written text messages between fixed-line phone or mobile phone and fixed or portable devices over a network...
, MMS
Multimedia Messaging Service
Multimedia Messaging Service, or MMS, is a standard way to send messages that include multimedia content to and from mobile phones. It extends the core SMS capability that allowed exchange of text messages only up to 160 characters in length.The most popular use is to send photographs from...
, email, Internet access, short-range wireless communications (infrared, Bluetooth
Bluetooth
Bluetooth is a proprietary open wireless technology standard for exchanging data over short distances from fixed and mobile devices, creating personal area networks with high levels of security...
), business applications, gaming and photography. Mobile phones that offer these and more general computing capabilities are referred to as smartphone
Smartphone
A smartphone is a high-end mobile phone built on a mobile computing platform, with more advanced computing ability and connectivity than a contemporary feature phone. The first smartphones were devices that mainly combined the functions of a personal digital assistant and a mobile phone or camera...
s.
The first hand-held mobile phone was demonstrated by Dr Martin Cooper of Motorola
Motorola
Motorola, Inc. was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, which was eventually divided into two independent public companies, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011, after losing $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009...
in 1973, using a handset weighing 2 1/2 lbs (about 1 kg). In 1983, the DynaTAC 8000x
Motorola DynaTAC
DynaTAC is a series of cellular telephones manufactured by Motorola, Inc. from 1983 to 1994. With several different models, plus newer models under the Classic and Ultra Classic names, it was the first line of cell phones commercially produced by Motorola, with the first member of the DynaTAC...
was the first to be commercially available. In the twenty years from 1990 to 2010, worldwide mobile phone subscriptions grew from 12.4 million to over 4.6 billion, penetrating the developing economies
Information and communication technologies for development
Information and Communication Technologies for Development is a general term referring to the application of Information and Communication Technologies within the fields of socioeconomic development, international development and human rights...
and reaching the bottom of the economic pyramid
Bottom of the pyramid
In economics, the bottom of the pyramid is the largest, but poorest socio-economic group. In global terms, this is the 2.5 billion people who live on less than $2.50 per day. The phrase “bottom of the pyramid” is used in particular by people developing new models of doing business that deliberately...
.
History
Radiophones have a long and varied history going back to Reginald FessendenReginald Fessenden
Reginald Aubrey Fessenden , a naturalized American citizen born in Canada, was an inventor who performed pioneering experiments in radio, including early—and possibly the first—radio transmissions of voice and music...
's invention and shore-to-ship demonstration of radio telephony, through the Second World War with military use of radio telephony links and civil services in the 1950s.
The first mobile telephone call made from a car occurred in St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis is an independent city on the eastern border of Missouri, United States. With a population of 319,294, it was the 58th-largest U.S. city at the 2010 U.S. Census. The Greater St...
, USA on June 17, 1946, using the Bell System
Bell System
The Bell System was the American Bell Telephone Company and then, subsequently, AT&T led system which provided telephone services to much of the United States and Canada from 1877 to 1984, at various times as a monopoly. In 1984, the company was broken up into separate companies, by a U.S...
's Mobile Telephone Service
Mobile Telephone Service
The Mobile Telephone Service is a pre-cellular VHF radio system that links to the Public Switched Telephone Network . MTS was the radiotelephone equivalent of land dial phone service. , only rural and wilderness areas were still using the system....
. The equipment weighed 80 pounds (36.3 kg), and the AT&T
AT&T
AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications corporation headquartered in Whitacre Tower, Dallas, Texas, United States. It is the largest provider of mobile telephony and fixed telephony in the United States, and is also a provider of broadband and subscription television services...
service, basically a massive party line, cost US$30 per month (equal to $ today) plus 30–40 cents per local call, equal to $ to $ today.
In 1956, the world’s first partly automatic car phone system, Mobile System A (MTA), was launched in Sweden. MTA phones were composed of vacuum tube
Vacuum tube
In electronics, a vacuum tube, electron tube , or thermionic valve , reduced to simply "tube" or "valve" in everyday parlance, is a device that relies on the flow of electric current through a vacuum...
s and relay
Relay
A relay is an electrically operated switch. Many relays use an electromagnet to operate a switching mechanism mechanically, but other operating principles are also used. Relays are used where it is necessary to control a circuit by a low-power signal , or where several circuits must be controlled...
s, and had a weight of 40 kg. In 1962, a more modern version called Mobile System B (MTB) was launched, which was a push-button telephone
Push-button telephone
The push-button telephone was first invented in 1941, and is a telephone with push-buttons or keys, and which eventually replaced rotary dial telephones that were first used in 1891. The first push-button telephone was invented in the labs of Bell Telephone; however, these models were only...
, and which used transistors to enhance the telephone’s calling capacity and improve its operational reliability, thereby reducing the weight of the apparatus to 10 kg. In 1971, the MTD
MTD (mobile network)
MTD was a manual mobile phone system for the 450 MHz frequency band. It was introduced in 1971 in Sweden, and lasted until 1987, when it was made obsolete by the NMT automatic service...
version was launched, opening for several different brands of equipment and gaining commercial success.
Martin Cooper, a Motorola
Motorola
Motorola, Inc. was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, which was eventually divided into two independent public companies, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011, after losing $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009...
researcher and executive is considered to be the inventor of the first practical mobile phone for handheld use in a non-vehicle setting, after a long race against Bell Labs
Bell Labs
Bell Laboratories is the research and development subsidiary of the French-owned Alcatel-Lucent and previously of the American Telephone & Telegraph Company , half-owned through its Western Electric manufacturing subsidiary.Bell Laboratories operates its...
for the first portable mobile phone. Using a modern, if somewhat heavy portable handset, Cooper made the first call on a handheld mobile phone on April 3, 1973 to his rival, Dr. Joel S. Engel
Joel S. Engel
Joel S. Engel is an American engineer, known for fundamental contributions to the development of cellular networks.Born in New York City, he obtained a B.Sc. in engineering at City College of New York...
of Bell Labs
Bell Labs
Bell Laboratories is the research and development subsidiary of the French-owned Alcatel-Lucent and previously of the American Telephone & Telegraph Company , half-owned through its Western Electric manufacturing subsidiary.Bell Laboratories operates its...
.
The first commercially automated cellular network (the 1G
1G
1G refers to the first-generation of wireless telephone technology, mobile telecommunications. These are the analog telecommunications standards that were introduced in the 1980s and continued until being replaced by 2G digital telecommunications...
) was launched in Japan by NTT
Nippon Telegraph and Telephone
, commonly known as NTT, is a Japanese telecommunications company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. Ranked the 31st in Fortune Global 500, NTT is the largest telecommunications company in Asia, and the second-largest in the world in terms of revenue....
in 1979, initially in the metropolitan area of Tokyo. Within five years, the NTT network had been expanded to cover the whole population of Japan and became the first nationwide 1G network. In 1981, this was followed by the simultaneous launch of the Nordic Mobile Telephone
Nordic Mobile Telephone
NMT is the first fully automatic cellular phone system...
(NMT) system in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. NMT was the first mobile phone network featuring international roaming
Roaming
In wireless telecommunications, roaming is a general term referring to the extension of connectivity service in a location that is different from the home location where the service was registered. Roaming ensures that the wireless device is kept connected to the network, without losing the...
. The first 1G network launched in the USA was Chicago-based Ameritech
Ameritech
AT&T Teleholdings, Inc., formerly known as Ameritech Corporation , was a U.S. telecommunications company that arose out of the 1984 AT&T divestiture. Ameritech was one of the seven Regional Bell Operating Companies that was created following the breakup of the Bell System...
in 1983 using the Motorola DynaTAC
Motorola DynaTAC
DynaTAC is a series of cellular telephones manufactured by Motorola, Inc. from 1983 to 1994. With several different models, plus newer models under the Classic and Ultra Classic names, it was the first line of cell phones commercially produced by Motorola, with the first member of the DynaTAC...
mobile phone. Several countries then followed in the early-to-mid 1980s including the UK, Mexico and Canada.
The first "modern" network technology on digital 2G
2G
2G is short for second-generation wireless telephone technology. Second generation 2G cellular telecom networks were commercially launched on the GSM standard in Finland by Radiolinja in 1991...
(second generation) cellular technology was launched by Radiolinja
Radiolinja
Radiolinja was a Finnish GSM operator founded on September 19, 1988. On March 27, 1991, the world's first GSM phone call was made on Radiolinja's network...
(now part of Elisa Group
Elisa Oyj
Elisa Oyj is a Finnish telecommunications company founded in 1882 that was known until July 2000 as HPY. Elisa Oyj employs about 3000 people and in 2007 had revenue of about €1.57 billion...
) in 1991 in Finland on the GSM standard, which also marked the introduction of competition in mobile telecoms when Radiolinja challenged incumbent Telecom Finland (now part of TeliaSonera
TeliaSonera
TeliaSonera AB is the dominant telephone company and mobile network operator in Sweden and Finland. The company has operations in other countries in Northern, Eastern Europe, Central Asia and Spain, with a total of 150 million mobile customers...
) who ran a 1G NMT network.
In 2001, the launch of 3G
3G
3G or 3rd generation mobile telecommunications is a generation of standards for mobile phones and mobile telecommunication services fulfilling the International Mobile Telecommunications-2000 specifications by the International Telecommunication Union...
(Third Generation) was again in Japan by NTT DoCoMo
NTT DoCoMo
is the predominant mobile phone operator in Japan. The name is officially an abbreviation of the phrase, "do communications over the mobile network", and is also from a compound word dokomo, meaning "everywhere" in Japanese. Docomo provides phone, video phone , i-mode , and mail services...
on the WCDMA standard.
One of the newest 3G technologies to be implemented is High-Speed Downlink Packet Access
High-Speed Downlink Packet Access
High-Speed Downlink Packet Access is an enhanced 3G mobile telephony communications protocol in the High-Speed Packet Access family, also dubbed 3.5G, 3G+ or turbo 3G, which allows networks based on Universal Mobile Telecommunications System to have higher data transfer speeds and capacity...
(HSDPA). It is an enhanced 3G
3G
3G or 3rd generation mobile telecommunications is a generation of standards for mobile phones and mobile telecommunication services fulfilling the International Mobile Telecommunications-2000 specifications by the International Telecommunication Union...
(third generation) mobile telephony
Mobile telephony
Mobile telephony is the provision of telephone services to phones which may move around freely rather than stay fixed in one location. Mobile phones connect to a terrestrial cellular network of base stations , whereas satellite phones connect to orbiting satellites...
communications protocol
Communications protocol
A communications protocol is a system of digital message formats and rules for exchanging those messages in or between computing systems and in telecommunications...
in the high-speed packet access (HSPA) family, also coined 3.5G, 3G+ or turbo 3G, which allows networks based on Universal Mobile Telecommunications System
Universal Mobile Telecommunications System
Universal Mobile Telecommunications System is a third generation mobile cellular technology for networks based on the GSM standard. Developed by the 3GPP , UMTS is a component of the International Telecommunications Union IMT-2000 standard set and compares with the CDMA2000 standard set for...
(UMTS) to have higher data transfer speeds and capacity.
Features
The common components found on all phones are:
- A battery, providing the power source for the phone functions.
- An input mechanism to allow the user to interact with the phone. The most common input mechanism is a keypadKeypadA keypad is a set of buttons arranged in a block or "pad" which usually bear digits, symbols and usually a complete set of alphabetical letters. If it mostly contains numbers then it can also be called a numeric keypad...
, but touch screens are also found in some high-end smartphones. - Basic mobile phone servicesGSM servicesGSM services are a standard collection of applications and features available to mobile phone subscribers all over the world. The GSM standards are defined by the 3GPP collaboration and implemented in hardware and software by equipment manufacturers and mobile phone operators...
to allow users to make calls and send text messages. - All GSM phones use a SIM cardSubscriber Identity ModuleA subscriber identity module or subscriber identification module is an integrated circuit that securely stores the International Mobile Subscriber Identity and the related key used to identify and authenticate subscriber on mobile telephony devices .A SIM is held on a removable SIM card, which...
to allow an account to be swapped among devices. Some CDMA devices also have a similar card called a R-UIM. - Individual GSM, WCDMA, iDEN and some satellite phone devices are uniquely identified by an International Mobile Equipment IdentityInternational Mobile Equipment IdentityThe International Mobile Equipment Identity or IMEI is a number, usually unique, to identify GSM, WCDMA, and iDEN mobile phones, as well as some satellite phones. It is usually found printed inside the battery compartment of the phone...
(IMEI) number.
Low-end mobile phones are often referred to as feature phone
Feature phone
A feature phone is a mobile phone that, like smartphones, combines the functions of a personal digital assistant and a mobile phone.Today's models typically also serve as portable media players and camera phones with touchscreen, GPS navigation, Wi-Fi and mobile broadband access.Feature phones is...
s, and offer basic telephony, as well as functions such as playing music and taking photos, and sometimes simple applications based on generic managed
Managed code
Managed code is a term coined by Microsoft to identify computer program code that requires and will only execute under the "management" of a Common Language Runtime virtual machine ....
platforms such as Java ME or BREW. Handsets with more advanced computing ability through the use of native software applications became known as smartphone
Smartphone
A smartphone is a high-end mobile phone built on a mobile computing platform, with more advanced computing ability and connectivity than a contemporary feature phone. The first smartphones were devices that mainly combined the functions of a personal digital assistant and a mobile phone or camera...
s. The first smartphone was the Nokia 9000 Communicator in 1996 which added PDA
PDA
A PDA is most commonly a Personal digital assistant, also known as a Personal data assistant, a mobile electronic device.PDA may also refer to:In science, medicine and technology:...
functionality to the basic mobile phone at the time. As miniaturization and increased processing power of microchips has enabled ever more features to be added to phones, the concept of the smartphone has evolved, and what was a high-end smartphone five years ago, is a standard phone today.
Several phone series have been introduced to address a given market segment, such as the RIM BlackBerry
BlackBerry
BlackBerry is a line of mobile email and smartphone devices developed and designed by Canadian company Research In Motion since 1999.BlackBerry devices are smartphones, designed to function as personal digital assistants, portable media players, internet browsers, gaming devices, and much more...
focusing on enterprise/corporate customer email needs; the SonyEricsson Walkman series of musicphones and Cybershot series of cameraphones; the Nokia Nseries
Nokia Nseries
Nokia Nseries is a multimedia smartphone product family which is engineered and marketed by the Nokia Corporation.The Nseries devices are known to commonly support multiple high-speed wireless technologies, such as 3G, or Wireless LAN....
of multimedia phones, the Palm Pre
Palm Pre
The Palm Pre is a multimedia smartphone designed and marketed by Palm with a multi-touch screen and a sliding keyboard. The smartphone was the first to use Palm's Linux based mobile operating system, webOS...
the HTC Dream
HTC Dream
The HTC Dream is an Internet-enabled smartphone with an operating system designed by Google and hardware designed by HTC...
and the Apple iPhone
IPhone
The iPhone is a line of Internet and multimedia-enabled smartphones marketed by Apple Inc. The first iPhone was unveiled by Steve Jobs, then CEO of Apple, on January 9, 2007, and released on June 29, 2007...
.
Other features that may be found on mobile phones include GPS navigation, music (MP3) and video (MP4) playback, RDS
Radio Data System
Radio Data System, or RDS, is a communications protocol standard for embedding small amounts of digital information in conventional FM radio broadcasts. RDS standardises several types of information transmitted, including time, station identification and programme information.Radio Broadcast Data...
radio receiver, alarms, memo recording, personal digital assistant
Personal digital assistant
A personal digital assistant , also known as a palmtop computer, or personal data assistant, is a mobile device that functions as a personal information manager. Current PDAs often have the ability to connect to the Internet...
functions, ability to watch streaming video, video download, video calling, built-in cameras (1.0+ Mpx
MPX
Multi-pointer X is a part of X input extension and previously a modification to the existing X.Org implementation of the X Window System. MPX provides multiple independent pointers at the windowing system level. These cursors are all connected to one computer...
) and camcorder
Camcorder
A camcorder is an electronic device that combines a video camera and a video recorder into one unit. Equipment manufacturers do not seem to have strict guidelines for the term usage...
s (video recording), with autofocus
Autofocus
An autofocus optical system uses a sensor, a control system and a motor to focus fully automatic or on a manually selected point or area. An electronic rangefinder has a display instead of the motor; the adjustment of the optical system has to be done manually until indication...
and flash, ringtones, games, PTT
Push to talk
Push-to-talk , also known as Press-to-Transmit, is a method of conversing on half-duplex communication lines, including two-way radio, using a momentary button to switch from voice reception mode to transmit mode....
, memory card reader
Memory card reader
A memory card reader is a device, typically having a USB interface, for accessing the data on a memory card such as a CompactFlash , Secure Digital or MultiMediaCard...
(SD), USB (2.0), dual line support, infrared
Infrared
Infrared light is electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength longer than that of visible light, measured from the nominal edge of visible red light at 0.74 micrometres , and extending conventionally to 300 µm...
, Bluetooth
Bluetooth
Bluetooth is a proprietary open wireless technology standard for exchanging data over short distances from fixed and mobile devices, creating personal area networks with high levels of security...
(2.0) and WiFi
WIFI
WIFI is a radio station broadcasting a brokered format. Licensed to Florence, New Jersey, USA, the station is currently operated by Florence Broadcasting Partners, LLC.This station was previously owned by Real Life Broadcasting...
connectivity, instant messaging
Instant messaging
Instant Messaging is a form of real-time direct text-based chatting communication in push mode between two or more people using personal computers or other devices, along with shared clients. The user's text is conveyed over a network, such as the Internet...
, Internet e-mail and browsing
Web browser
A web browser is a software application for retrieving, presenting, and traversing information resources on the World Wide Web. An information resource is identified by a Uniform Resource Identifier and may be a web page, image, video, or other piece of content...
and serving as a wireless modem
Wireless modem
A wireless modem is a type of modulator-demodulator which connects to a wireless network instead of using telephone or cable television lines...
. Nokia
Nokia
Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...
and the University of Cambridge demonstrated a bendable cell phone called the Morph
Nokia Morph
The Nokia Morph is a concept mobile phone created by Finnish company Nokia. The concept, which was unveiled on February 25, 2008 at The Museum of Modern Art in New York City, was the product of a joint study into the future of mobile phones by the Nokia Research Center and the University of...
. Some phones can make mobile payment
Mobile Payment
Mobile financial services, also referred to as mobile money, mobile payment, mobile banking, mobile money transfer and mobile wallet generally refer to payment services operated under financial regulation and performed from or via a mobile device....
s via direct mobile billing schemes or through contactless payment
Contactless payment
Contactless payment systems are credit cards and debit cards, key fobs, smartcards or other devices which use RFID for making secure payments. The embedded chip and antenna enable consumers to wave their card or fob over a reader at the point of sale. Some suppliers claim that transactions can be...
s if the phone and point of sale
Point of sale
Point of sale or checkout is the location where a transaction occurs...
support Near Field Communication
Near Field Communication
Near field communication, or NFC, allows for simplified transactions, data exchange, and wireless connections between two devices in proximity to each other, usually by no more than a few centimeters. It is expected to become a widely used system for making payments by smartphone in the United States...
(NFC). Some of the largest mobile phone manufacturers and network providers along with many retail merchants support, or plan to support, contactless payments through NFC-equipped mobile phones.
Some phones have an electromechanical transducer
Transducer
A transducer is a device that converts one type of energy to another. Energy types include electrical, mechanical, electromagnetic , chemical, acoustic or thermal energy. While the term transducer commonly implies the use of a sensor/detector, any device which converts energy can be considered a...
on the back which changes the electrical voice signal into mechanical vibrations. The vibrations flow through the cheek bones or forehead allowing the user to hear the conversation. This is useful in the noisy situations or if the user is hard of hearing.
Software and applications
The most commonly used data application on mobile phones is SMS
SMS
SMS is a form of text messaging communication on phones and mobile phones. The terms SMS or sms may also refer to:- Computer hardware :...
text messaging. The first SMS text message was sent from a computer to a mobile phone in 1992 in the UK, while the first person-to-person SMS from phone to phone was sent in Finland in 1993.
Other non-SMS data services used on mobile phones include mobile music, downloadable logos and pictures, gaming, gambling, adult entertainment and advertising. The first downloadable mobile content was sold to a mobile phone in Finland in 1998, when Radiolinja (now Elisa) introduced the downloadable ringtone service. In 1999, Japanese mobile operator NTT DoCoMo introduced its mobile Internet service, i-Mode
I-mode
NTT DoCoMo's i-mode is a mobile internet service popular in Japan. Unlike Wireless Application Protocol, i-mode encompasses a wider variety of internet standards, including web access, e-mail and the packet-switched network that delivers the data...
, which today is the world's largest mobile Internet service.
The first mobile news service, delivered via SMS, was launched in Finland in 2000. Mobile news
Mobile news
- Mobile news delivery :Today, mobile news delivery can be done via SMS, by specialized applications, or using mobile versions of media websites. According to a recent market study across six countries , 16.9% of consumers access news and information via mobile devices, either via browser,...
services are expanding with many organizations providing "on-demand" news services by SMS. Some also provide "instant" news pushed out by SMS.
Mobile payments were first trialled in Finland in 1998 when two Coca-Cola vending machines in Espoo were enabled to work with SMS payments. Eventually, the idea spread and in 1999 the Philippines launched the first commercial mobile payments systems, on the mobile operators Globe and Smart. Today, mobile payments ranging from mobile banking
Mobile Banking
Mobile banking is a term used for performing balance checks, account transactions, payments, credit applications and other banking transactions through a mobile device such as a mobile phone or Personal Digital Assistant . The earliest mobile banking services were offered over SMS...
to mobile credit cards to mobile commerce are very widely used in Asia and Africa, and in selected European markets.
Power supply
Rechargeable battery
A rechargeable battery or storage battery is a group of one or more electrochemical cells. They are known as secondary cells because their electrochemical reactions are electrically reversible. Rechargeable batteries come in many different shapes and sizes, ranging anything from a button cell to...
batteries. There are a variety of ways used to charge cell phones, including USB, portable batteries, mains power (using an AC adapter
AC adapter
The AC adapter, AC/DC adapter or AC/DC converter is a type of external power supply, often enclosed in what looks like an over-sized AC plug. Other names include plug pack, plug-in adapter, adapter block, domestic mains adapter, line power adapter, or power adapter...
), cigarette lighters (using an adapter), or a dynamo. In 2009, the first wireless charger was released for consumer use.
Various initiatives, such as the EU Common External Power Supply
Common External Power Supply
In 2009 several government, consumer and industry initiatives resulted in the European Union's definition of a common External Power Supply for use with data-enabled mobile phones sold in the EU. An external power supply is the AC power adapter that converts household AC voltages to the much...
have been announced to standardize the interface to the charger, and to promote energy efficiency of mains-operated chargers. A star rating system is promoted by some manufacturers, where the most efficient chargers consume less than 0.03 watts and obtain a five-star rating.
A popular early mobile phone battery was the nickel metal-hydride (NiMH) type, due to its relatively small size and low weight. Lithium ion
Lithium ion battery
A lithium-ion battery is a family of rechargeable battery types in which lithium ions move from the negative electrode to the positive electrode during discharge, and back when charging. Chemistry, performance, cost, and safety characteristics vary across LIB types...
batteries are also used, as they are lighter and do not have the Voltage depression due to long-term over-charging that nickel metal-hydride batteries do. Many mobile phone manufacturers use lithium–polymer batteries as opposed to the older Lithium-Ion, the main advantages being even lower weight and the possibility to make the battery a shape other than strict cuboid. Mobile phone manufacturers have been experimenting with alternative power sources, including solar cell
Solar cell
A solar cell is a solid state electrical device that converts the energy of light directly into electricity by the photovoltaic effect....
s.
SIM card
Integrated circuit
An integrated circuit or monolithic integrated circuit is an electronic circuit manufactured by the patterned diffusion of trace elements into the surface of a thin substrate of semiconductor material...
called a Subscriber Identity Module or SIM Card, to function. The SIM card is approximately the size of a small postage stamp and is usually placed underneath the battery in the rear of the unit. The SIM securely stores the service-subscriber key (IMSI)
International Mobile Subscriber Identity
An International Mobile Subscriber Identity or IMSI is a unique identification associated with all GSM and UMTS network mobile phone users. It is stored as a 64 bit field in the SIM inside the phone and is sent by the phone to the network...
used to identify a subscriber on mobile telephony devices (such as mobile phones and computers). The SIM card allows users to change phones by simply removing the SIM card from one mobile phone and inserting it into another mobile phone or broadband telephony device.
A SIM card contains its unique serial number, internationally unique number of the mobile user (IMSI), security authentication and ciphering information, temporary information related to the local network, a list of the services the user has access to and two passwords (PIN for usual use and PUK for unlocking).
SIM cards are available in three standard sizes. The first is the size of a credit card (85.60 mm × 53.98 mm x 0.76 mm, defined by ISO/IEC 7810 as ID-1). The newer, most popular miniature version has the same thickness but a length of 25 mm and a width of 15 mm (ISO/IEC 7810 ID-000), and has one of its corners truncated (chamfered) to prevent misinsertion. The newest incarnation known as the 3FF or micro-SIM has dimensions of 15 mm × 12 mm. Most cards of the two smaller sizes are supplied as a full-sized card with the smaller card held in place by a few plastic links; it can easily be broken off to be used in a device that uses the smaller SIM.
The first SIM card was made in 1991 by Munich smart card maker Giesecke & Devrient
Giesecke & Devrient
Giesecke & Devrient is a German company headquartered in Munich that provides banknote and securities printing, smart cards, and cash handling systems....
for the Finnish wireless network operator Radiolinja
Radiolinja
Radiolinja was a Finnish GSM operator founded on September 19, 1988. On March 27, 1991, the world's first GSM phone call was made on Radiolinja's network...
. Giesecke & Devrient sold the first 300 SIM cards to Elisa (ex. Radiolinja).
Those cell phones that do not use a SIM Card have the data programmed in to their memory. This data is accessed by using a special digit sequence to access the "NAM" as in "Name" or number programming menu. From there, information can be added, including a new number for the phone, new Service Provider numbers, new emergency numbers, new Authentication Key or A-Key code, and a Preferred Roaming List or PRL. However, to prevent the phone being accidentally disabled or removed from the network, the Service Provider typically locks this data with a Master Subsidiary Lock (MSL). The MSL also locks
SIM lock
A SIM lock, simlock, network lock or subsidy lock is a capability built into GSM phones by mobile phone manufacturers. Network providers use this capability to restrict the use of these phones to specific countries and network providers...
the device to a particular carrier when it is sold as a loss leader
Loss leader
A loss leader or leader is a product sold at a low price to stimulate other profitable sales. It is a kind of sales promotion, in other words marketing concentrating on a pricing strategy. A loss leader is often a popular article...
.
The MSL applies only to the SIM, so once the contract has expired, the MSL still applies to the SIM. The phone, however, is also initially locked by the manufacturer into the Service Provider's MSL. This lock may be disabled so that the phone can use other Service Providers' SIM cards. Most phones purchased outside the U.S. are unlocked phones because there are numerous Service Providers that are close to one another or have overlapping coverage. The cost to unlock a phone varies but is usually very cheap and is sometimes provided by independent phone vendors.
A similar module called a Removable User Identity Module or RUIM card is present in some CDMA networks, notably in China and Indonesia.
Multi-card hybrid phones
A hybrid mobile phone can take more than one SIM card, even of different types. The SIM and RUIM cards can be mixed together, and some phones also support three or four SIMs.
From 2010 onwards they became popular in India and Indonesia and other emerging markets, attributed to the desire to obtain the lowest on-net calling rate. In Q3 2011, Nokia
Nokia
Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...
shipped 18 million of its low cost dual SIM phone range in an attempt to make up lost ground in the higher end smartphone market.
Display
Mobile phones have a display deviceDisplay device
A display device is an output device for presentation of information in visual or tactile form...
, some of which are also touch screens. The screen size varies greatly by model and is usually specified either as width and height in pixels or the diagonal measured in inch
Inch
An inch is the name of a unit of length in a number of different systems, including Imperial units, and United States customary units. There are 36 inches in a yard and 12 inches in a foot...
es.
Some mobiles have more than one display, for example the Kyocera Echo
Kyocera Echo
The Kyocera Echo is a smartphone manufactured by Kyocera International of Japan, and distributed by Sprint in the United States. It runs the Google Android operating system. It was announced by Sprint on 7 February 2011, and released for sale 17 April 2011.It is unusual in having two 3.5" screens...
, an Android smartphone
Smartphone
A smartphone is a high-end mobile phone built on a mobile computing platform, with more advanced computing ability and connectivity than a contemporary feature phone. The first smartphones were devices that mainly combined the functions of a personal digital assistant and a mobile phone or camera...
with a dual 3.5 inch screen. The screens can also be combined into a single 4.7 inch tablet style computer
Tablet computer
A tablet computer, or simply tablet, is a complete mobile computer, larger than a mobile phone or personal digital assistant, integrated into a flat touch screen and primarily operated by touching the screen...
.
Central processing unit
Mobile phones have central processing unitCentral processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...
s (CPUs), similar to those in computers, but optimised to operate in low power environments.
Mobile CPU performance depends not only on the clock rate (generally given in multiples of hertz
Hertz
The hertz is the SI unit of frequency defined as the number of cycles per second of a periodic phenomenon. One of its most common uses is the description of the sine wave, particularly those used in radio and audio applications....
) but also the memory hierarchy
Memory hierarchy
The term memory hierarchy is used in the theory of computation when discussing performance issues in computer architectural design, algorithm predictions, and the lower level programming constructs such as involving locality of reference. A 'memory hierarchy' in computer storage distinguishes each...
also greatly affects overall performance. Because of these problems, the performance of mobile phone CPUs is often more appropriately given by scores derived from various standardized tests to measure the real effective performance in commonly used applications.
Manufacturers
See also: List of best-selling mobile phonesChina Mobile
China Mobile Limited is a Chinese state-owned telecommunication company that provides mobile voice and multimedia services through its nationwide mobile telecommunications network, the largest of its kind in the world...
with over 500 million mobile phone subscribers. Over 50 mobile operators have over 10 million subscribers each, and over 150 mobile operators have at least one million subscribers by the end of 2009 (source wireless intelligence). In February 2010, there were 4.6 billion mobile phone subscribers, a number that is estimated to grow.
Prior to 2010, Nokia
Nokia
Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...
was the market leader. However, during that year competition emerged in the Asia Pacific region with brands such as Micromax, Nexian
Nexian
Nexian is a mobile phone company in Indonesia. It has the second largest market share with 25% of mobile phones. Nexian creates QWERTY phones supported by Indonesian mobile operators. Phones with two SIM card slots retail at a price between Indonesian rupiah 299,000 to 1,299,000.-Android:Nexian...
, and i-Mobile and chipped away at Nokia's market share. Android powered smartphones also gained momentum across the region at the expense of Nokia. In India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, their market share also dropped significantly to around 31 percent from 56 percent in the same period. Their share was displaced by Chinese and Indian vendors of low-end mobile phones.
In 2010 worldwide sales were 1.6 billion units, an increase of 31.8 percent from 2009. The top five manufacturers by market share were Nokia followed by Samsung, LG Electronics, ZTE and Apple. The last three replaced RIM, Sony Ericsson and Motorola who were previously among the top five list. Outside the top five a significant market share increase from 16.5 percent to 30.6 percent was achieved by many smaller and new brands.
In Q1 2011, Apple surpassed Nokia as the world's biggest handset vendor by revenue, as Nokia's market share dropped to 29 percent in Q1 2011, the lowest level since the late 1990s. In June 2011, Nokia announced lower expectations for sales and margin due to global competition in both low-and-high end markets.
By Q2 2011, worldwide sales grew 16.5 percent to 428.7 million units.
| Manufacturer | Gartner Gartner Gartner, Inc. is an information technology research and advisory firm headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, United States. It was known as GartnerGroup until 2001.... |
IDC International Data Corporation International Data Corporation is a market research and analysis firm specializing in information technology, telecommunications and consumer technology. IDC is a subsidiary of International Data Group... |
|---|---|---|
| Nokia Nokia Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki... |
22.8% | 24.2% |
| SAMSUNG Samsung Electronics Samsung Electronics is a South Korean multinational electronics and information technology company headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul... |
16.3% | 19.2% |
| LG LG Electronics LG Electronics is a global electronics and telecommunications company headquartered in Yeouido, Seoul, South Korea. The company operates its business through five divisions: mobile communications, home entertainment, home appliance, air conditioning and business solution... |
5.7% | 6.8% |
| Apple IPhone The iPhone is a line of Internet and multimedia-enabled smartphones marketed by Apple Inc. The first iPhone was unveiled by Steve Jobs, then CEO of Apple, on January 9, 2007, and released on June 29, 2007... |
4.6% | 5.6% |
| ZTE ZTE ZTE Corporation formerly Zhongxing Telecommunication Equipment Corporation is a Chinese multinational telecommunications equipment and systems company headquartered in Shenzhen, China... |
3.0% | 4.5% |
| Others | 47.6% | 39.7% |
- Note: Vendor shipments are branded shipments and exclude OEM sales for all vendors
Other manufacturers outside the top five are Research In Motion Ltd.
Research In Motion
Research In Motion Limited or RIM is a Canadian multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada that designs, manufactures and markets wireless solutions for the worldwide mobile communications market...
(RIM), HTC Corporation, Motorola
Motorola
Motorola, Inc. was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, which was eventually divided into two independent public companies, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011, after losing $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009...
, Huawei
Huawei
Huawei is a Chinese multinational networking and telecommunications equipment and services company headquartered in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China...
, Sony Ericsson
Sony Ericsson
Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB is a joint venture established on October 1, 2001 by the Japanese consumer electronics company Sony Corporation and the Swedish telecommunications company Ericsson to manufacture mobile phones....
. Smaller players include Audiovox
Audiovox
Audiovox Corporation is an American consumer electronics company founded in 1965 and headquartered in Hauppauge, New York.Among the domestic brands now owned by Audiovox are: Acoustic Research, Advent, Code Alarm, Invision, Jensen, Prestige, RCA, and Terk. The international brands they own include...
(now UTStarcom
UTStarcom
UTStarcom is a Fortune 1000 company that specializes in IP-based networking products for telecommunications companies and service providers. Its core markets are multimedia communications and broadband, including IP and entertainment , next generation broadband networks and optical network solutions...
), BenQ-Siemens
BenQ-Siemens
BenQ-Siemens was the mobile communications subsidiary of Taiwanese BenQ Corp. The division was formed out of BenQ's acquisition of the then struggling Siemens mobile group in 2005. The stated goal of the company was to pull together BenQ's lifestyle experience, their design team and Siemens'...
, CECT, Fujitsu
Fujitsu
is a Japanese multinational information technology equipment and services company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is the world's third-largest IT services provider measured by revenues....
, Kyocera
Kyocera
is a multinational manufacturer based in Kyoto, Japan. It was founded as in 1959 by Kazuo Inamori and renamed in 1982. The company has diversified its founding technology in ceramic materials through internal development as well as strategic mergers and acquisitions...
, Mitsubishi Electric
Mitsubishi Electric
is a multinational electronics and information technology company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is one of the core companies of the Mitsubishi Group....
, NEC, Panasonic, Palm, Pantech Wireless Inc.
Pantech Curitel
Pantech Curitel is a South Korean company specializing in manufacturing mobile phones. It was established in 2000. Its market is mainly domestic, but Pantech Curitel also has interests in Brazil, Japan, Hong Kong, China, India, Europe, Australia, Taiwan, USA, Mexico and Canada. It is currently the...
, Philips
Philips
Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. , more commonly known as Philips, is a multinational Dutch electronics company....
, Qualcomm Inc.
Qualcomm
Qualcomm is an American global telecommunication corporation that designs, manufactures and markets digital wireless telecommunications products and services based on its code division multiple access technology and other technologies. Headquartered in San Diego, CA, USA...
, Sagem
SAGEM Communication
SAGEMCOM is a French company, headquartered in Rueil-Malmaison, involved in communication systems and consumer electronics.Formerly a division of SAGEM , Sagemcom became, in 2005, a subsidiary of SAFRAN, the high-technology international group formed by the merger of SAGEM and Snecma...
, Sanyo
Sanyo
is a major electronics company and member of the Fortune 500 whose headquarters is located in Moriguchi, Osaka prefecture, Japan. Sanyo targets the middle of the market and has over 230 Subsidiaries and Affiliates....
, Sharp
Sharp Corporation
is a Japanese multinational corporation that designs and manufactures electronic products. Headquartered in Abeno-ku, Osaka, Japan, Sharp employs more than 55,580 people worldwide as of June 2011. The company was founded in September 1912 and takes its name from one of its founder's first...
, Sierra Wireless
Sierra Wireless
Sierra Wireless is a wireless communications equipment designer and manufacturer, founded in 1993 and currently headquartered in Richmond, British Columbia, Canada....
, Just5
Just5
Just5 is an international brand of a designer and manufacturer of cell phones with big buttons. Development of Just5 cell phones started in 2008, the trade mark was introduced on October 5, 2009....
, SK Teletech, T&A Alcatel
TCL Corporation
TCL Corporation is a multinational electronics company headquartered in Huizhou, Guangdong, China. In 2010 it was the world's 25th-largest consumer electronics producer and sixth-largest television producer .TCL comprises three listed companies: TCL Corporation , which is listed on the Shenzhen...
, Trium
Trium
Trium was a brand of mobile phones made by Mitsubishi. Models included the Trium Mars, Trium Eclipse,, Trium 110, Trium Aria, Trium Astral, Trium Aura, Trium Cosmo, Trium Galaxy, Trium GEO, Trium M21i, Trium M320, Trium Mondo, Trium Mystral, Trium Neptune, Trium Odyssey, Trium Sirius, Trium M341i....
, Toshiba
Toshiba
is a multinational electronics and electrical equipment corporation headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is a diversified manufacturer and marketer of electrical products, spanning information & communications equipment and systems, Internet-based solutions and services, electronic components and...
, and Vidalco.
In general
Mobile phones are used for a variety of purposes, including keeping in touch with family members, conducting business, and having access to a telephone in the event of an emergency. Some people carry more than one cell phone for different purposes, such as for business and personal use. Multiple SIM cards may also be used to take advantage of the benefits of different calling plans—a particular plan might provide cheaper local calls, long-distance calls, international calls, or roaming. The mobile phone has also been used in a variety of diverse contexts in society, for example:- A study by MotorolaMotorolaMotorola, Inc. was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, which was eventually divided into two independent public companies, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011, after losing $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009...
found that one in ten cell phone subscribers have a second phone that often is kept secret from other family members. These phones may be used to engage in activities including extramarital affairs or clandestine business dealings. - Some organizations assist victims of domestic violence by providing mobile phones for use in emergencies. They are often refurbished phones.
- The advent of widespread text messaging has resulted in the cell phone novel; the first literary genre to emerge from the cellular age via text messagingText messagingText messaging, or texting, refers to the exchange of brief written text messages between fixed-line phone or mobile phone and fixed or portable devices over a network...
to a website that collects the novels as a whole. - Mobile telephonyMobile telephonyMobile telephony is the provision of telephone services to phones which may move around freely rather than stay fixed in one location. Mobile phones connect to a terrestrial cellular network of base stations , whereas satellite phones connect to orbiting satellites...
also facilitates activism and public journalism being explored by ReutersReutersReuters is a news agency headquartered in New York City. Until 2008 the Reuters news agency formed part of a British independent company, Reuters Group plc, which was also a provider of financial market data...
and Yahoo!Yahoo!Yahoo! Inc. is an American multinational internet corporation headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, United States. The company is perhaps best known for its web portal, search engine , Yahoo! Directory, Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Groups, Yahoo! Answers, advertising, online mapping ,...
and small independent news companies such as Jasmine News in Sri Lanka.
- The United NationsUnited NationsThe United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
reported that mobile phones have spread faster than any other technology and can improve the livelihood of the poorest people in developing countries by providing access to information in places where landlineLandlineA landline was originally an overland telegraph wire, as opposed to an undersea cable. Currently, landline refers to a telephone line which travels through a solid medium, either metal wire or optical fibre, as distinguished from a mobile cellular line, where transmission is via radio waves...
s or the Internet are not available, especially in the least developed countries. Use of mobile phones also spawns a wealth of micro-enterprises, by providing work, such as selling airtime on the streets and repairing or refurbishing handsets. - In Mali and other African countries, people travel from village to village to let friends and relatives know about weddings, births and other events, which is avoided if the villages are within mobile phone coverage areas. In many African countries, mobile phone coverage is greater than land line penetration, so most people own a mobile phone. In the smaller villages without electricity, phones are recharged using a solar panel or motorcycle battery.
- The TV industry has recently started using mobile phones to drive live TV viewing through mobile apps, advertising, social tv, and mobile TVMobile TVMobile television usually means television watched on a small handheld device. It may be a pay TV service broadcast on mobile phone networks or received free-to-air via terrestrial television stations from either regular broadcast or a special mobile TV transmission format...
. 86% of Americans use their mobile phone while watching TV. - Branchless bankingBranchless bankingBranchless banking is a distribution channel strategy used for delivering financial services without relying on bank branches. While the strategy may complement an existing bank branch network for giving customers a broader range of channels through which they can access financial services,...
has been successful in Kenya, South Africa and Philippines. A pilot project in BaliBaliBali is an Indonesian island located in the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, lying between Java to the west and Lombok to the east...
was launched in 2011 by the International Finance CorporationInternational Finance CorporationThe International Finance Corporation promotes sustainable private sector investment in developing countries.IFC is a member of the World Bank Group and is headquartered in Washington, D.C., United States....
and an IndonesianIndonesianThe word Indonesian may refer to:* Anything of, from, or related to Indonesia, a country in Southeast Asia* A person from Indonesia, or of Indonesian descent. For information on the Indonesian people, see Demographics of Indonesia and Culture of Indonesia...
bank Bank MandiriBank MandiriBank Mandiri , headquartered in Jakarta, is the largest bank in Indonesia in term of assets, loans and deposits. Total assets as of Q2 2010 were IDR 402.1 trillion . It also has Capital Adequacy Ratio of 23% , Return on Asset of 0.71 %, and Return on Equity of 7.38 %...
. - In parts of the world, mobile phone sharing is common. It is prevalent in urban India, as families and groups of friends often share one or more mobiles among their members. There are obvious economic benefits, but often familial customs and traditional gender roles play a part. For example, in Burkina Faso, it is not uncommon for a village to have access to only one mobile phone. The phone is typically owned by a person who is not natively from the village, such as a teacher or missionary, but it is expected that other members of the village are allowed to use the cell phone to make necessary calls.
By the media
In 1998, one of the first examples of selling media content through the mobile phone was the sale of ringtones by Radiolinja in Finland. Soon afterwards, other media content appeared such as news, video games, jokes, horoscopes, TV content and advertising. Most early content for mobile tended to be copies of legacy media, such as the banner advertisement or the TV news highlight video clip. Recently, unique content for mobile has been emerging, from the ringing tones and ringback tones in music to "mobisodes," video content that has been produced exclusively for mobile phones.In 2006, the total value of mobile-phone-paid media content exceeded Internet-paid media content and was worth 31 billion dollars. The value of music on phones was worth 9.3 billion dollars in 2007 and gaming was worth over 5 billion dollars in 2007.
The advent of media on the mobile phone has also produced the opportunity to identify and track alpha users or hubs, the most influential members of any social community. AMF Ventures measured in 2007 the relative accuracy of three mass media, and found that audience measures on mobile were nine times more accurate than on the Internet and 90 times more accurate than on TV.
The mobile phone is often called the "fourth screen" (if counting cinema, TV and PC screens as the first three) or "third screen" (counting only TV and PC screens). It is also called the seventh of the mass media
Seven mass media
The seven mass media, or often used as "seventh mass media channel", to draw attention to the latest mobile phones as a mass media, are a new concept and neoliberalism to distinguish the major mass media channels and highlight their relative merits and benefits...
(with print, recordings, cinema, radio, TV and internet the first six).
Whilst driving
Due to the increasing complexity of mobile phones, they are often more like mobile computers in their available uses. This has introduced additional difficulties for law enforcement officials in distinguishing one usage from another as drivers use their devices. This is more apparent in those countries which ban both handheld and hands-free usage, rather those who have banned handheld use only, as officials cannot easily tell which function of the mobile phone is being used simply by looking at the driver. This can lead to drivers being stopped for using their device illegally on a phone call when, in fact, they were using the device for a legal purpose such as the phone's incorporated controls for car stereo or satnav.
A recently published study has reviewed the incidence of mobile phone use while cycling and its effects on behaviour and safety.
In schools
Some schools limit or restrict the use of mobile phones. Schools set restrictions on the use of mobile phones because of the use of cell phones for cheating on tests, harassment and bullying, causing threats to the schools security, distractions to the students, and facilitating gossip and other social activity in school. Many mobile phones are banned in school locker room facilities, public restrooms and swimming pools due to the built-in cameras that most phones now feature.Tracking and privacy
Mobile phones are also commonly used to collect location data. While the phone is turned on, the geographical location of a mobile phone can be determined easily (whether it is being used or not), using a technique known multilaterationMultilateration
Multilateration is a navigation technique based on the measurement of the difference in distance to two or more stations at known locations that broadcast signals at known times. Unlike measurements of absolute distance or angle, measuring the difference in distance results in an infinite number of...
to calculate the differences in time for a signal to travel from the cell phone to each of several cell towers near the owner of the phone.
The movements of a mobile phone user can be tracked by their service provider and, if desired, by law enforcement agencies and their government. Both the SIM card and the handset can be tracked.
China has proposed using this technology to track commuting patterns of Beijing city residents. In the UK and US, law enforcement and intelligence services use mobiles to perform surveillance. They possess technology to activate the microphones in cell phones remotely in order to listen to conversations that take place near to the person who holds the phone.
Health effects
The effect mobile phone radiation has on human health is the subject of recent interest and study, as a result of the enormous increase in mobile phone usage throughout the world. Mobile phones use electromagnetic radiationElectromagnetic radiation
Electromagnetic radiation is a form of energy that exhibits wave-like behavior as it travels through space...
in the microwave
Microwave
Microwaves, a subset of radio waves, have wavelengths ranging from as long as one meter to as short as one millimeter, or equivalently, with frequencies between 300 MHz and 300 GHz. This broad definition includes both UHF and EHF , and various sources use different boundaries...
range, which some believe may be harmful to human health. A large body of research exists, both epidemiological
Epidemiology
Epidemiology is the study of health-event, health-characteristic, or health-determinant patterns in a population. It is the cornerstone method of public health research, and helps inform policy decisions and evidence-based medicine by identifying risk factors for disease and targets for preventive...
and experimental, in non-human animals
Animal model
An animal model is a living, non-human animal used during the research and investigation of human disease, for the purpose of better understanding the disease without the added risk of causing harm to an actual human being during the process...
and in humans, of which the majority shows no definite causative relationship between exposure to mobile phones and harmful biological effects in humans. This is often paraphrased simply as the balance of evidence showing no harm to humans from mobile phones, although a significant number of individual studies do suggest such a relationship, or are inconclusive. Other digital wireless systems
Wireless electronic devices and health
The World Health Organization has acknowledged that electromagnetic fields are influencing the environment , and that some people are worried about possible effects...
, such as data communication networks, produce similar radiation.
On 31 May 2011, the World Health Organization
World Health Organization
The World Health Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations that acts as a coordinating authority on international public health. Established on 7 April 1948, with headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, the agency inherited the mandate and resources of its predecessor, the Health...
confirmed that mobile phone use may represent a long-term health risk, classifying mobile phone radiation as a "carcinogenic hazard" and "possibly carcinogenic to humans" after a team of scientists reviewed peer-review studies on cell phone safety. One study of past cell phone use cited in the report showed a "40% increased risk for gliomas (brain cancer) in the highest category of heavy users (reported average: 30 minutes per day over a 10‐year period)." This is a reversal from their prior position that cancer was unlikely to be caused by cellular phones or their base stations and that reviews had found no convincing evidence for other health effects. Certain countries, including France, have warned against the use of cell phones especially by minors due to health risk uncertainties.
At least some recent studies have found an association between cell phone use and certain kinds of brain and salivary gland tumors. Lennart Hardell and other authors of a 2009 meta-analysis of 11 studies from peer-reviewed journals concluded that cell phone usage for at least ten years “approximately doubles the risk of being diagnosed with a brain tumor on the same ('ipsilateral') side of the head as that preferred for cell phone use.”
In addition, a mobile phone can spread infectious disease
Infectious disease
Infectious diseases, also known as communicable diseases, contagious diseases or transmissible diseases comprise clinically evident illness resulting from the infection, presence and growth of pathogenic biological agents in an individual host organism...
s by its frequent contact with hands. One study came to the result that pathogenic bacteria
Pathogenic bacteria
Pathogenic bacteria are bacteria that cause bacterial infection. This article deals with human pathogenic bacteria.Although the vast majority of bacteria are harmless or beneficial, quite a few bacteria are pathogenic...
are present on approximately 40% of mobile phones belonging to patients in a hospital, and on approximately 20% of mobile phones belonging to hospital staff.
Future evolution: Broadband Fourth generation (4G)
The recently released 4th generation, also known as Beyond 3G, aims to provide broadband wireless accessBroadband wireless access
Wireless Broadband refers to technology that provides high-speed wireless Internet access or computer networking access over a wide area.-The term broadband:...
with nominal data rates of 100 Mbit/s to fast moving devices, and 1 Gbit/s to stationary devices defined by the ITU-R
ITU-R
The ITU Radiocommunication Sector is one of the three sectors of the International Telecommunication Union and is responsible for radio communication....
4G systems may be based on the 3GPP
3GPP
The 3rd Generation Partnership Project is a collaboration between groups of telecommunications associations, known as the Organizational Partners...
LTE (Long Term Evolution) cellular standard, offering peak bit rates of 326.4 Mbit/s. It may perhaps also be based on WiMax
WiMAX
WiMAX is a communication technology for wirelessly delivering high-speed Internet service to large geographical areas. The 2005 WiMAX revision provided bit rates up to 40 Mbit/s with the 2011 update up to 1 Gbit/s for fixed stations...
or Flash-OFDM wireless metropolitan area network technologies that promise broadband wireless access
Broadband wireless access
Wireless Broadband refers to technology that provides high-speed wireless Internet access or computer networking access over a wide area.-The term broadband:...
with speeds that reaches 233 Mbit/s for mobile users. The radio interface in these systems is based on all-IP packet switching
Packet switching
Packet switching is a digital networking communications method that groups all transmitted data – regardless of content, type, or structure – into suitably sized blocks, called packets. Packet switching features delivery of variable-bit-rate data streams over a shared network...
, MIMO
MIMO
In radio, multiple-input and multiple-output, or MIMO , is the use of multiple antennas at both the transmitter and receiver to improve communication performance. It is one of several forms of smart antenna technology...
diversity, multi-carrier modulation schemes, Dynamic Channel Assignment (DCA) and channel-dependent scheduling. A 4G system should be a complete replacement for current network infrastructure and is expected to be able to provide a comprehensive and secure IP solution where voice, data, and streamed multimedia can be given to users on a "Anytime, Anywhere" basis, and at much higher data rates than previous generations.
In March 2011, KT from South Korea announced that they has expanded its high-speed wireless broadband network by 4G
4G
In telecommunications, 4G is the fourth generation of cellular wireless standards. It is a successor to the 3G and 2G families of standards. In 2009, the ITU-R organization specified the IMT-Advanced requirements for 4G standards, setting peak speed requirements for 4G service at 100 Mbit/s...
WiBro
WiBro
WiBro is a wireless broadband Internet technology developed by the South Korean telecoms industry. WiBro is the South Korean service name for IEEE 802.16e international standard...
cover 85 percent of the population. It is the largest broadband network covered in the world, followed by Japan and US with 70 percent and 36 percent respectively.
In early 2011, 4G mobile phones were released by Motorola
Motorola
Motorola, Inc. was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, which was eventually divided into two independent public companies, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011, after losing $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009...
, HTC
HTC
-Companies:*HTC Corporation, a Taiwanese manufacturer of handheld devices*Harrisonville Telephone Company, a telephone company in Waterloo, Illinois*Horry Telephone Cooperative, a telephone cooperative in Horry County, South Carolina...
and Samsung
Samsung
The Samsung Group is a South Korean multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea...
.
See also
- Car phoneCar phoneA car phone is a mobile phone device specifically designed for and fitted into an automobile.In the late 1970s and 1980s, the car phone was more popular than the regular mobile phone...
- Cordless telephoneCordless telephoneA cordless telephone or portable telephone is a telephone with a wireless handset that communicates via radio waves with a base station connected to a fixed telephone line, usually within a limited range of its base station...
- Customer proprietary network informationCustomer Proprietary Network InformationCustomer proprietary network information is the data collected by telecommunications companies about a consumer's telephone calls. It includes the time, date, duration and destination number of each call, the type of network a consumer subscribes to, and any other information that appears on the...
- Field telephoneField telephoneField telephones are mobile telephones intended for military use, designed to withstand wartime conditions. They can draw power from their own battery, from a telephone exchange , or from an external power source. Some need no battery, being sound-powered telephones.Field telephones were first used...
- IP PhoneIP PhoneA VoIP phone uses voice over IP technologies allowing telephone calls to be made over an IP network such as the Internet instead of the ordinary PSTN system. Calls can traverse the Internet, or a private IP network such as that of a company...
- List of best-selling mobile phones
- List of countries by number of mobile phones in use
- Mobile broadbandMobile BroadbandMobile broadband is the marketing term for wireless Internet access through a portable modem, mobile phone or other mobile device.-Description:...
- Mobile Internet device (MID)
- NomophobiaNomophobiaNomophobia is the fear of being out of mobile phone contact. The term, an abbreviation for "no-mobile-phone phobia", was coined during a study by the UK Post Office who commissioned YouGov, a UK-based research organisation to look at anxieties suffered by mobile phone users...
- OpenBTSOpenBTSOpenBTS is a software-based GSM access point, allowing standard GSM-compatible mobile phones to make telephone calls without using existing telecommunication providers' networks...
- Personal Handy-phone SystemPersonal Handy-phone SystemThe Personal Handy-phone System , also marketed as the Personal Access System and commercially branded as Xiaolingtong in China, is a mobile network system operating in the 1880–1930 MHz frequency band, used mainly in Japan, China, Taiwan, and some other Asian countries and...
- Prepaid mobile phone
- Professional Mobile RadioProfessional Mobile RadioProfessional mobile radio are field radio communications systems which use portable, mobile, base station, and dispatch console radios...
- Satellite phoneSatellite phoneA satellite telephone, satellite phone, or satphone is a type of mobile phone that connects to orbiting satellites instead of terrestrial cell sites...
- Tethering
Further reading
- Agar, Jon, Constant Touch: A Global History of the Mobile Phone, 2004 ISBN 1-84046-541-7
- Ahonen, Tomi, m-Profits: Making Money with 3G Services, 2002, ISBN 0-470-84775-1
- Ahonen, Kasper and Melkko, 3G Marketing 2004, ISBN 0-470-85100-7
- Glotz, Peter & Bertsch, Stefan, eds. Thumb Culture: The Meaning of Mobile Phones for Society, 2005
- Jain, S. Lochlann. "Urban Errands: The Means of Mobility"]. Journal of Consumer Culture 2:3 (November, 2002) 385–404. .
- Katz, James E. & Aakhus, Mark, eds. Perpetual Contact: Mobile Communication, Private Talk, Public Performance, 2002
- Kavoori, Anandam & Arceneaux, Noah, eds. The Cell Phone Reader: Essays in Social Transformation, 2006
- Kopomaa, Timo. The City in Your Pocket, Gaudeamus 2000
- Levinson, PaulPaul LevinsonPaul Levinson is an American author and professor of communications and media studies at Fordham University in New York City. Levinson's novels, short fiction, and non-fiction works have been translated into twelve languages....
, Cellphone: The Story of the World's Most Mobile Medium, and How It Has Transformed Everything!, 2004 ISBN 1-4039-6041-0 - Ling, Rich, The Mobile Connection: the Cell Phone's Impact on Society, 2004 ISBN 1-55860-936-9
- Ling, Rich and Pedersen, Per, eds. Mobile Communications: Re-negotiation of the Social Sphere, 2005 ISBN 1-85233-931-4
- Home page of Rich Ling
- Nyíri, Kristóf, ed. Mobile Communication: Essays on Cognition and Community, 2003
- Nyíri, Kristóf, ed. Mobile Learning: Essays on Philosophy, Psychology and Education, 2003
- Nyíri, Kristóf, ed. Mobile Democracy: Essays on Society, Self and Politics, 2003
- Nyíri, Kristóf, ed. A Sense of Place: The Global and the Local in Mobile Communication, 2005
- Nyíri, Kristóf, ed. Mobile Understanding: The Epistemology of Ubiquitous Communication, 2006
- Plant, Dr. SadieSadie PlantSadie Plant is a British author and philosopher.She earned her Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Manchester in 1989, then taught at the University of Birmingham's Department of Cultural Studies before going on to found the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit at the University of Warwick,...
, on the mobile – the effects of mobile telephones on social and individual life, 2001 - Rheingold, HowardHoward Rheingold-See also:* Collective intelligence* Information society* The WELL* Virtual community-External links:***** at TED conference** a 48MB Quicktime movie, hosted by the Internet Archive...
, Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution, 2002 ISBN 0-7382-0861-2
External links
- "The Long Odyssey of the Cell Phone", 15 photos with captions from Time magazine
- Cell Phone, the ring heard around the world—a video documentary by the Canadian Broadcasting CorporationCanadian Broadcasting CorporationThe Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly known as CBC and officially as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian crown corporation that serves as the national public radio and television broadcaster...