The mobile phone turned 40 on Wednesday, with no fanfare to mark the occasion in a market which seemed focused on new smartphones like the iPhone and a possible Facebook-themed device.

The first mobile call was placed April 3, 1973, by Motorola engineer Martin Cooper, head of a team working on mobile communication technologies.

Cooper made the call on Sixth Avenue in New York, before going into a press conference using a Motorola DynaTAC -- a device that weighed one kilogram, (2.2 pounds) and had a battery life of 20 minutes, according to Motorola.

Cooper told the technology website The Verge last year that he placed the first call to a rival, Joel Engel of Bell Labs.

"To this day, he resents what Motorola did in those days," Cooper said.

"They thought that we were a gnat, an obstacle... we believed in competition and lots of players. And we also believed -- our religion was portables, because people are mobile. And here they were trying to make a car telephone and a monopoly on top of that. So that battle was the reason that we built that phone."

Cooper and his team were honored earlier this year with the Draper Prize by the National Academy of Engineering for their work.

In 40 years, the industry has come a long way. Research firm IDC predicts 900 million smartphones will be sold in 2013 -- along with roughly the same number of more basic feature phones.

And the phone has become a key advertising platform -- eMarketer said US mobile advertising spending grew 178 percent last year to $4.11 billion, and spending is expected to rise a further 77.3 percent to $7.29 billion in 2013.

Sony-Olympus deal gets the go-ahead: companies
Tokyo (AFP) April 3, 2013 - A joint-venture deal between Sony and medical equipment maker Olympus has won regulatory approval, the firms said Wednesday, after it was held up by China's competition watchdog.

"Olympus and Sony today announced that the two parties recently received all necessary regulatory approvals and now expect to establish the medical business venture company on April 16, 2013," a statement said.

Sony and Olympus had initially planned the launch of a joint venture from April 1 as Sony, which is trying to repair a dented balance sheet, invests 50 billion yen ($535 million) in Olympus as part of a drive to tap the lucrative medical equipment market.

Although it is better known by the public for its cameras, Olympus controls about 70 percent of the global market for medical endoscopes.

Olympus, which is recovering from a huge accounting scandal, said in a joint statement with Sony last week that the deal -- first announced in September -- was held up over approvals from an unspecified authority.

Both firms declined to elaborate but sources confirmed to AFP that the hold-up was linked to Chinese regulators.

The issue comes at a time when Tokyo and Beijing are embroiled in a tense territorial dispute over an island chain in the East China Sea, which sparked protests in China and a consumer boycott of Japanese goods.

Regulatory delays involving other Japanese firms have also been linked to delays from Chinese watchdogs as well, including Japanese advertising firm Dentsu's now-completed $4.8 billion takeover of Britain's Aegis media group.