Vodafone to launch touchscreen handset

Vodafone Group Plc, the world's biggest provider of mobile-phone services, will offer a new touch-screen version of the BlackBerry handset under an exclusive agreement with Research in Motion Ltd.

The handset, called Storm, has a clickable touch-screen instead of a traditional keyboard and will go on sale next month in Europe, India, Australia and New Zealand, the Newbury, England-based company said in an e-mailed statement yesterday. In the US, the handset will be available exclusively from Verizon Wireless, the second-biggest US mobile-phone company.

Vodafone owns a 45 percent stake in the US carrier. The new BlackBerry handset will compete with other so-called smartphones, such as Apple Inc's iPhone and Google's G1 device. The market for smartphones that can send e-mail and access the Web may more than double to 288 million units in 2009, according to Stamford, Connecticut-based researcher Gartner Inc.