Vodafone set to announce own brand mobiles

3G branded handsets coming October - supposedly

28 September 2006 0:45 GMT / By Stuart Miles

Vodafone is set to announce it will sell own-brand low-cost 3G handsets from October, a source close to the company has told Reuters, the news agency.

According to the news service "Huawei Technologies, China's largest telecoms equipment maker, will supply the handsets, adding the deal would allow Vodafone to have the handsets customized for its specific services".

The handsets will be available in all Vodafone's major markets on both contract and prepay tariffs.

Vodafone is currently the only operator not to offer own brand mobile phones. Although it does sells self-branded phones and exlcusives like the new Palm Treo 750v, the company has always opted to carry the name of the manufacturer on the handset.

T-Mobile, O2 and Orange already offer mobile phones under their own brands.

T-Mobile and O2 use mobile phone manufacture HTC, which until recently only made white label phones for the operators.

Full tags

Phones, Mobile phones, 3G, Vodafone