Led by the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), the nine local infocomm companies that made up the Singapore Pavilion put up a strong showing at the recent Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, as they explored opportunities for collaboration and sought to extend their market reach.

Fixed & Mobile ( www.fixedandmobile.com ), which provides integrated voice and data services to mobile operators, Internet service providers and international telecommunication carriers, received "very positive feedback" for its solution "Transfer To", said marketing manager Rahma Bel-Bachir. "Transfer To" is an international mobile top-up solution for credit transfers from as low as $1.

"We met several potential partners and customers from the Middle East, Europe and Africa," said Ms Bel-Bachir. "It was a truly global event, and we had several leads especially with mobile operators in these regions."

This was exactly what Fixed & Mobile, a first-time exhibitor at Mobile World Congress, had hoped to achieve at the event. "We joined the show to reach the global mobile market, as our business is mainly oriented towards the international market," Ms Bel-Bachir added.

Fixed & Mobile's "Transfer To" solution drew interest from potential partners and customers from the Middle East, Europe and Africa.

Like Fixed & Mobile, mobile solutions provider Mozat ( www.morange.com ) also went to Barcelona with the aim of exploring collaboration opportunities with telecom operators, mobile service providers and phone manufacturers. "Yes, we met lots of them," said Mozat's vice president of marketing, Ms Li Yan. "We even met potential investors unexpectedly."

Mozat showcased Morange, an integrated mobile platform which supports mobile social networking, push mail, remote PC, mobile instant messaging, mobile Voice over IP, international short message service (SMS), news, mobile blogs, podcasts, RSS and many more. According to Mozat, Morange aims to "converge and connect all the dots in the mobile users' lives".

Other members of the Singapore Pavilion included Bubble Motion ( www.bubblemotion.com ), a pioneer in voice SMS; Hotcard Technology ( www.hotcardtech.com ), which focuses on embedded camera input technologies; i-Sirius, a one-stop services company and supplier for consumer telecommunications; mBit (www.mbit.tv), a leader in IP Multimedia Subsystem and mobile Web 2.0 services for the distribution of content; Orange Gum ( www.orangegum.com ), a platform and infrastructure partner for telecommunications industry players; Telogic ( www.telogic.com.sg ), which specialises in telecom core network technologies; and Ufinity ( www.ufinity.com ), which provides innovative mobile and security technologies.

IDA's efforts in putting together the Singapore Pavilion drew praise from the participants.

"We are amazed by the effort put in by IDA in organising this event and the opportunities created for us to meet our potential customers and partners," said Ms Li of Mozat. "We really appreciate the help offered by all the IDA staff on-site."

The view was echoed by Ms Bel-Bachir. "During the event, IDA helped us to welcome our potential customers in the meeting areas, showing appropriate support, information and assistance under the Singapore Pavilion. It was really appreciated by our visitors and gave a highly professional impression," she said.