This year's event, held at the 62,000-square-metre Singapore Expo, accommodated 2,238 exhibitors from 54 countries. If the last year saw the emergence of the first slim 3G cell phones, this year will offer phones with the benefits of an iPod.

Each company had glitzy booths to showcase their wares and Sony Ericsson concentrated on their Walkman and Cyber-shot mobile phone.

The highlight of the Walkman series was the W850i, with a 262k colour TAT and 240x320 pixels. It is capable of storing up to 1,000 songs on its 1 gigabyte (GB) memory stick, with a track identification that recognises song titles from its FM radio and even the microphone recording of a song.

W950i is a 4 GB music player that holds up to 3,000 songs. The 3G phone is only 15mm thick.

And highlight of the Cyber-shot series is the K790i with a 3.2-mega-pixel camera, built-in xenon flash and auto focus.

Product manager Mekata Satoshi said Sony Ericsson products designed the functions of every product to target different markets.

The Walkman and Cyber-shot phones are expected to draw the most attention in Thailand this year, he said.

At the end of 2006, Sony Ericsson will hold an exhibition to showcase the phones and phones from the Walkman series will be launched throughout the year.

Budsarakham Sinlapalavan

The Nation