One strong indicator of a rebound in the telecom sector has been the wider attendance in the traditional big annual events, and 3GSM is no exception to that trend. This year’s audience has been one of the biggest over the past few years, with quite a few notable developments, including, among others:

- gizmos galore: lots of mobile handsets that I have never seen on the other side of the Atlantic, including the introductions of a variety of new phone models.  There have been a few new models introduced, including Motorola's impressive slim black Razr.

- Microsoft made a full court press with its wireless initiatives in the enterprise and carrier spaces.  The Peabody is a new GSM/GPRS low-cost platform based on the Windows Mobile software.  Although Microsoft finally overtook Palm in the handheld market, the mobile phone market still remains an elusive target.  The company claimed that Microsoft Windows Mobile-based devices are capable of yielding a higher jump in ARPU than its competitors (37% higher).  On the enterprise front, Microsoft secured another ActiveSync licensing agreement, this time with Nokia, which joins Motorola and palmOne.  Microsoft also added Flextronics to its Smartphone ecosystem. 

- the IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) architecture is being covered in several sessions, including Convedia co-founder Grant Henderson’s talk today (Convedia is a key IMS enabler, being the de-facto leader in media servers).  IMS is a framework that provides a SIP-based control layer with open interfaces to the transport layer below and the services layer above. This will allow wireline, wireless and cable operators control over services on a per-session basis. Even though the original IMS concept was originally defined as a 3GPP specification, the IETF also is developing the standard, and even CableLabs is incorporating the IMS concept into its planning.

The pace has been quite hectic today, and considering that Monday is supposedly a "slow" day at 3GSM, perhaps this is indicative of many more new product launches and announcements to come.