Vodafone 360 replaces Vodafone Live suit

London: Vodafone will this week unveil its answer to the threat posed by the iPhone and its recent touchscreen imitators with a new service - called Vodafone 360 - that integrates a host of social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter, and includes a store of applications that will eventually be available to the company's more than 315 million global customers.

It will replace the Vodafone Live suite of mobile internet services, which was heralded as the company's most important launch ever when it was unveiled seven years ago but has been made to look "tired" by the recent proliferation of mobile applications and the success of devices such as the iPhone, Palm Pre and handsets using Google's Android software.

Vodafone 360 is an attempt by the world's largest network to retain the direct connection between mobile phone operators and consumers which these new devices have undermined by allowing users to download their own applications from third-party "app stores".

The explosion in touchscreen devices and the success of the iTunes apps store has made downloadable mobile widgets the hottest thing in mobile technology and has given handset manufacturers a way of making revenues from users above and beyond the initial sale of a handset. Nokia, with its Ovi store, RIM, with its BlackBerry App World, and Samsung have all leapt into the applications market. But all these services risk turning the mobile phone operators into little more than providers carrying traffic for other people's services.

Vodafone stocks the iPhone in 11 countries and sells the HTC Magic, which uses Google's Android platform, in the UK; but it has long maintained that the most important relationship for a mobile phone customer should be with their network, not with the maker of their handset.

The company gave software developers the information they need to design applications for phones supporting the new Vodafone store.

Unlike Apple's iTunes and Google's Android Marketplace, however, users will be able to buy applications by adding the cost to their phone bills, instead of having to register a credit card with a third party.