Whether or not the timing of the announcement was a happy coincidence is known only to Sony and Ericsson themselves, but it was an unusual press conference. The invite didn’t come until just before half past seven Thursday morning – for a conference starting at ten the same day – and the whole affair was resolutely low-key, with Hans Vestberg and Howard Stringer on a temporary stage in a subterranean conference room in a hotel by Tower Bridge. This isn’t the way these things normally work.

The owners of handset joint venture Sony Ericsson are to part company, with Japanese electronics firm Sony acquiring the 50 per cent share of the JV held by Sweden’s Ericsson for €1.05bn. The announcement comes ten years after the formation of Sony Ericsson, which saw two struggling handset units combined in the hope of marrying Sony’s consumer electronics expertise and Ericsson’s telecoms experience.

What does it mean when the executives start jumping ship from Nokia to Sony Ericsson? This week Tommi Laine-Ylijoki, who worked until recently as VP of materials management at Nokia, joined Sony Ericsson as head of operations, reporting directly to CEO Bert Nordberg.

Sony Ericsson has launched its own channel on the Android Market. The handset maker claims that it is the first manufacturer to offer such a service, which will be operator-dependent. Owners of Sony Ericsson handsets will now see the “my apps” feature on their Android phone replaced with the Sony Ericsson channel, although they will still be able to access “my apps” from the phone’s menu. While this last change may cause consternation among some users, Xperia users may find direct access to software geared specifically towards them handy