The world's mobile communications industry flocks to Cannes next week in their best spirits since 2000, buoyed by hopes that wireless pictures, music, even small-screen television, is primed to go mainstream. This year marks the true test for long-delayed 3G services in Europe, four years after operators wrecked their balance sheets by paying more than 100 billion euros for new high-speed, third-generation (3G) mobile licenses in 2000. Mobile phone operators at next week's 3GSM World Congress in southern France are scouting for new ideas, such as improved photo printing from camera phones and simplified services for business users, to help lure consumers. However, first there must be phones. Analysts are worried there will not be enough quality video, picture and Internet data phones available for the mass market before early 2005. "We are going to be nailing the manufacturers to demand 3G handsets now," said one of Europe's top mobile phone operators. "There are just barely any 3G devices," complained Jan Sythoff, a mobile phone analyst with market research firm Frost & Sullivan in London, adding they are also bulky and expensive. Japan and Korea have been selling 3G services for two to three years. But in Europe, only Hutchison Whampoa and Telekom Austria have launched the services. The United States lags even further behind. Following a stellar Christmas for phone sales and the recent high-priced bidding war for No. 3 U.S. mobile operator AT&T Wireless, this year's 3GSM World Congress should offer further evidence that the $414 billion industry has turned the corner after a nearly three-year slowdown. The Cannes conference functions both as a premiere industry marketing event and as an endless series of sales meetings among its players. Diaries of top phone executives are packed with sales calls to discuss ideas such as games that can be played with opponents around the world or tools that allow clients to watch video, edit a document and talk on the phone at the same time. French-controlled Orange, Europe's third-ranked cellphone group by customers, is looking for fresh possibilities for its lucrative line of co-branded and co-designed handsets. The phones pull in double the revenues of off-the-shelf phones thanks to new revenues from services such as musical ringtones, picture messaging and e-mail. This year, consumers also can expect walkie talkie group calls. However, underlying debates over software and computer chip standards must be solved if the world's top consumer electronics market wants to grow beyond the 500 million phones sold last year to the industry's 1.2 billion mobile subscribers. A big software battle is being fought between open source Linux, Nokia-controlled Symbian and Microsoft, all aiming to be the operating system of choice for smartphones that manage these advanced data services. "I think there will not be one operating system dominating. There will be two. Which two, that needs to be determined," Siemens's mobile chief Rudi Lamprecht said. Texas Instruments, the largest maker of chips used to power mobile phones, will detail plans for its next generation of wireless circuits, due in phones next year. It will show off designs to support new features including high-resolution, four-megapixel camera phones. Texas Instruments looks to fend off mounting competition from top computer chip maker Intel Corp. and Asian suppliers in the market to build more than 560 million phones, which consumers are expected to buy this year. Dozens of software firms in Cannes will also tap into the emerging multimedia market, from games developers like In-Fusio, to song-recognition services like Shazam and MusiKube, location and navigation software companies like Webraska and Telmap, Internet browser Opera and screen interface company Trigenix. Reuters