Germany

The most eagerly awaited gadget of the year, Apple's iPhone, goes on sale in Britain and Germany this week to test European appetite for the mobile phone that thousands queued for in the U.S. in June.

Consumer electronics company Apple, mobile phone retailer Carphone Warehouse and mobile operator O2 will open stores around 1800 GMT on Friday in Britain for just four hours for a hoped-for stampede for the touch-screen phone.

In Germany it will be sold by Deutsche Telekom's mobile phone division T-Mobile. It will go on sale in one Telekom shop in Cologne just after midnight on Friday morning and will then roll out across the country.

Hundreds of extra staff have been taken on, and companies are hoping Apple's combined iPod music player, Web browser and camera will catch the public imagination in time for Christmas.

O2 UK, owned by Spanish telecoms group Telefonica, secured the exclusive network deal for the phone in Britain and expects the device to be its fastest-selling handset yet, with around 200,000 selling by the three outlets by Christmas and the New Year.

Carphone Warehouse, Europe's top independent mobile phone retailer, said last week that it could sell up to 10,000 in the first day. T-Mobile has not given any sales forecasts.

Not all analysts are convinced.

Most handsets in Europe are subsidised in return for customers signing up to contracts lasting perhaps 18 months or two years, but iPhones will cost 269 pounds ($560) in Britain on top of an 18-month contract costing a minimum of 35 pounds per month.

In Germany it will cost 399 euros ($580) with a two-year minimum monthly fee of 49 euros. Apple slashed the iPhone price in the United States by $200 to $399 in September.

Unlike many other phones, it will run on enhanced second generation (2G) networks, rather than the faster 3G system, though it will automatically switch onto speedy local wireless, or wifi, networks where these are available.

Gartner analyst Carolina Milanesi said the unsubsidised price could put some people off in Britain, but she still expected it to be one of the most wanted consumer electronic products this Christmas.

"The 200,000 number O2 referred to as a target market is quite safe," she said. "We think 350,000 iPhones could be sold in the first two months."

Analyst Thomas Friedrich from UniCredit's German unit HVB said he did not expect it to be as popular as it has been in the United States and said it would be more geared towards those willing to pay for a luxury item in Germany.

Milanesi said she thought the iPhone would spur other manufacturers to improve their user interface, and on Monday a new competitor emerged.

Google, the world's leading Internet company, said on Monday it would offer a software system to make the Internet work as smoothly on mobile phones as it does on computers. Google-based phones are due to appear in the latter half of next year.

German solar cell maker Ersol took its first step into the Indian photovoltaic market by winning a contract to supply solar cells to Solar Semiconductor, Ersol said on Thursday.
Its shares jumped 5.5 percent to 72.20 euros by 0815 GMT, easily outperforming Germany's technology index, which was up 0.9 percent.Ersol said it would deliver multi- and monocrystalline silicon -solar cells worth 126 million euros ($178 million) over 10 years starting in 2008 to solar module maker Solar Semiconductor, which is based in India and in the United States.
Solar Semiconductor said the solar cells would be used for module production at its manufacturing plant in Hyderabad, India."As we move towards thinner solar cells adding this ... technology ensures a stronger connection between cells, lower breakage rates, and better power efficiency," said Hari Surapaneni, head of Solar Semiconductor in a statement.
"We plan to double our current module manufacturing capacity of 50 megawatts by early 2008 with more rapid expansion planned in the coming 10 to 15 months," he added.

Worldwide Internet Audience has Grown 10 Percent in Last Year, According to comScore Networks

India, China and Russia Experience Highest Audience Growth Rates Year-over-Year; Canada, Israel, and Korea Log the Most Time Online

comScore Networks, a leader in measuring the digital age, today announced that 747 million people, age 15+, used the Internet worldwide in January 2007, a 10-percent increase versus January 2006. Among the top 15 countries (ranked by penetration), Internet audiences in India, the Russian Federation and China increased the most in 2006, growing 33, 21 and 20 percent, respectively. China now represents the second-largest Internet population in the world, with 86.8 million users, after the U.S., which rose 2 percent year-over-year to 153.4 million users age 15 or older in January 2007.