(3GSM is on in Bercelona, and we have our special correspondent - who goes by the code name of "Richard Wray" - to spy on those gathered there. Here's his first report.)
What brings the bosses of Vodafone, T-Mobile, Orange, Telefonica Moviles, Telecom Italia and even China Mobile together? The threat posed by the internet, apparently. As executives and their assorted hangers-on got familiar with the new venue for the industry's annual backslapping-fest the 3GSM WorldCongress, moved from Cannes to Barcelona after 14 years, the industry's big guns were sat around the top table to wow the world's press with their latest idea.
Pause now to imagine what it might be. A breakthrough concept. Think for a moment. Radical. New. Got an idea? OK? Ready? Here it is, then.
Instant messaging on mobile phones.
Phoo. Breathe out. OK, IM is not a new idea, having already attracted at least 300m users on the web. But we're talking about an industry that has never been very good at coming up with new ideas. The worry for the mobile phone operators is that the likes of Google, eBay, Yahoo -- and AOL on a good day -- have managed to create communities of people that want to chat to each other.
Initially this chatting posed no threat to the closely guarded revenues of the operators as the internet was far from mobile and most people connected to the web used their mobile while they were online. But the rise of wireless technologies potentially outside the operator's control, such as Wi-Fi and -- coming to a town near you soon -- WiMax, coupled with the introduction of easy to use VoIP services such as Skype will allow these internet companies to take their communities based around IM and make them mobile.
Perhaps the most telling words to come out of the first day of the 3GSM Congress were comments from Nokia's mobile phone chief Kai Oistamo that "With companies like Skype, Google, Yahoo and Vonage and so on, one can firmly say that VoIP has become the topic of the day."
Nokia was careful to reassure the operators that they can use VoIP to their advantage but the subtext was that the world's largest maker of mobile phones realizes that the internet boys are coming. Nokia took the opportunity at the show to launch a new phone [perhaps this wasn't that surprising at a show about the mobile world - tech ed], the Nokia 6136, which can exploit unlicensed spectrum such as that used by Wi-Fi services.
In the hands of a Google or a Skype the 6136 could become a powerful tool to break the stranglehold which the mobile phone networks have on mobility. Getting together to launch IM appears to be a tacit admission by the mobile phone operators that while they may lose the initial battle, as techies meld IM with VoIP to knock them out of the game, they are going to fight hard to keep hold of the rest of us (and charge us for the privilege).
Tuesday's excitement will be around mobile TV as Steve Ballmer takes the stand and announces that Virgin Mobile and BT are using his latest HTC-produced smartphone for a service to launch in the UK later this year. But as delegates file off to their opening night party -- to swap stories about who has had their mobile pinched by the local pickpockets -- the message from the operators is clear: Google et al, stay off our turf.
