singly important for the telecom business. Comparisons between new terminals are frequently published. Lack of terminals seems to be one of the most hampering factors in the telecom development. Terminals are indeed very complex devices, and it is easy to underestimate the necessary development efforts. A fairly new trend is that the big operators want to sell the devices with the name of the operator on them, although someone else manufactures the main part. Examples are Sprint in the USA, NTT DoCoMo in Japan and Vodafone in the UK. The operators usually subsidize the devices when sold with a subscription. Terminals Some important success factors for terminals are: Flexibility in upgrading, with configuration over the air Power consumption - stand-by time Security Ease of use - single sign on. Design, 'sexy devices' Personal assistant function/feeling 10.3 HISTORY In order to get a perspective of the fast-changing pace, let us take a look at what was written a few years ago. Figure 10.4 shows a multifunctional device presented by the French TV channel Canal+ at the IBC'98 expo. It is particularly intriguing that the device also is a TV set. In 1998 Telia described the development of the mobile service demands from 1990 to 1998 and then to 2003. One single terminal can handle all communication needs at reasonable tariffs. See Figure 10.5. 10.4 TERMINALS FOR MOBILE NETWORKS The following subsections describe the current range of categories. In the coming years, the market will be even more segmented, with products tailor-made for specific applica- tions, but there will also be a convergence in terminal functionality as well as multifunction terminals. Let us start with some existing terminal types. See Figure 10.6. 10.4.1 FEATURE PHONE In this category there are products that combine good voice capability with text-based messaging and data. Micro-service support by WAP is used for non-voice applications Technology convergence: A multifunctional device from 1998 Set top box Run by MEDIA HIGHWAY SYSTEMS This is a ph