Mobile phone users are looking for a more personal experience and, in doing so, are looking for PC-like IT services, it is claimed.

Rob Dalgety, commercial director for Mformation Technologies, says flexible access to a range of applications is just one of the features mobile users have become to expect.

"Mobile operators are looking to deliver a wider set of services to users - promoting increased mobile internet activity is one route to meeting increasingly diverse customer needs," he continues.

He adds that internet service providers are looking to work alongside mobile operators to provide "compelling services" to customers.

According to Tellabs, the first major survey of European and US mobile users conducted during the economic slump gives the telecom industry reasons to be optimistic as users intend to dramatically increase the number of mobile data services.

Up to 71 per cent of consumers anticipate they will use services such as mobile internet daily, it also discovered.

In a recent survey of SMEs for Connect, the two most important benefits of outsourcing were guaranteed response times and allowing in-house IT staff to concentrate on more strategic issues.