Over the past few years, Research In Motion Ltd. (RIMM) has been playing defense. It's certainly a terrible strategy in light of its rivals, which include Apple, Inc. (AAPL) and Google, Inc. (GOOG). As a result, the stock price for RIM has been lackluster. Unfortunately, it looks like things will only get worse.

Consider that it is only now that RIM is thinking about buying a mobile advertising network (according to a report from the Wall Street Journal). Of course, Apple has already entered the business with its $250 million purchase of Quattro Wireless and Google shelled out $750 million for AdMob.

When it comes to mobile, eBay (EBAY) has definitely been aggressive. Then again, this is a way to jump-start its e-commerce business, which has faced competitive pressures over the past few years.

So this week, eBay announced two new iPhone apps -- one for the global marketplace and the other for the company's classifieds site. In fact, it is now possible to take a photo and list an item within 60 seconds.

Even for a company the size of Nokia (NYSE: NOK), a quarterly loss of $834 million is still a big deal. And, this is what the company posted for its Q3 report (it's the first net loss since 1996).

OK, the main reason for the red ink was the write-down of a joint venture with Siemens that develops network equipment. No doubt, the business has been brutal. But, Nokia somehow thinks there's potential for growth.

Bharti Airtel Ltd. (ISE: 55QN) missed analyst expectations for the second quarter. The largest mobile phone operator in India gained clients in the country's smaller towns and villages, resulting in lower than expected revenues. The company pulled in INR99.4 billion ($2.05 billion) for the second quarter -- compared to analyst expectations of INR101.7 billion. Nonetheless, revenue was up from INR84.8 billion for the second quarter of 2008. Net income grew 24% to INR25.2 billion. Net of a tax gain, however, the company missed analyst forecasts of INR23.6 billion.

Salesforce.com (NYSE: CRM) has built an empire by changing the business model of software; that is, by charging on-going subscriptions. For the most part, it tends to be more affordable than the traditional approach, which involves heavy upfront licensing.

It looks like the recession is hurting mobile phones sales. According to The Wall Street Journal, "For the full year, Gartner said it expects handset sales to grow 11% to 1.28 billion phones, slowing from last year's 16% growth."

A trend of that magnitude is bound to hit every company in the industry, but some have the financial strength and market share to weather the storm, That is especially true of Nokia (NYSE: NOK), which has a global market share of 40% of handset sales. Samsung, which has 15% of the market and is one of the largest companies in Asia, should also be fine.

Motorola (NYSE: MOT) is another matter. Its global share has dropped from nearly 15% to just above 10% in a year. More financial pressure could poison its chances of spinning off its handset operation in 2009. It is already questionable whether the division has any value at all.

The Motorola 10-Q shows that revenue at the company's mobile device operation fell 22% last quarter to $3.33 billion. The operating loss for the unit was $346 million. If the handset market as a whole is reaching a challenging period, what is to become of the weakest player in the industry?

The answer is that Motorola may not be able to get rid of its handset operation. It may be faced with the much harder task of fixing it.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wallst.com.

"Whenever anyone asks, 'Why invest in China?' the answer is very simple: that's where the money is, and it's where exponential future economic growth is also," says Jim Trippon.

The editor of The China Stock Digest then asks, "Will China suffers an Oympic hangover?" Here, he explains why that should not happen and offers a look at China Mobile (NYSE: CHL), which he calls the "top dog" in the Chinese wireless sector.

"The Bank of China (BOC) conducted a study of the effects of 12 Olympiads on their host countries over the course of 60 years. They found that nine of the twelve Olympic host countries suffered a decline in GDP growth in the eight years after the games.

"The key to a post Olympic slump is the size of the economy. Smaller economies like Korea suffered larger downturns after the games, while larger economies like the United States were not affected at all. In smaller economies the enormous investment dedicated to staging Olympic games created an arti?cial bubble which was followed by a slump when Olympic building booms came to an end.

"China has made one of the largest investments ever in the Olympic Games with some estimates of spending topping $40 billion. But we don't believe the capital city will go into a slump after the games.

Of course, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) demonstrated the huge value of owning a pervasive operating system.

But what about the OS for mobile? Microsoft has been building its own alternative. Moreover, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) has Android.

However, the winner may actually be the handset maker, Nokia (NYSE: NOK). This week, the company announced it is purchasing Symbian, which has about 60% of the global market for the mobile OS. The offer comes to about $409.8 million (to grab the 52% that Nokia doesn't already own).

But, unlike Microsoft, Nokia isn't taking a proprietary approach. Instead, Symbian is going to be open source.

True, this is likely to take some time (say several years), but in the meantime, Nokia can leverage its massive global platform by using Symbian's 1,200 programmers. The upshot should be improved innovation and faster product launches (oh, and there will be no need to pay licensing fees to Symbian).

OK, so what about rival handset makers that rely on Symbian, such as Motorola (NYSE: MOT), Sony Ericsson Mobile and Samsung? Might they be worried?

Perhaps, but then again, they realize the importance of having standardization. And by being open source, the handset makers have the leeway to add their own capabilities.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates MergerBook.com.

For the tech business people I know, there are two "must haves:" a BlackBerry -- Research in Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM)'s smartphone -- and a profile on LinkedIn, a social network that has 19 million members.

But, interestingly enough, the two systems haven't been able to talk to each other – that is, until now.

Today, LinkedIn has launched a mobile version of its service. In fact, not only can you use it with your BlackBerry, but also on Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL)'s iPhone as well as other devices.

What's more, LinkedIn has added language support for English, French, German, Spanish, Japanese and Chinese.

However, the mobile edition is in the beta phase and as a result, the feature set is somewhat limited. For example, you can't accept an invitation or even update your profile. Yet, I'm sure LinkedIn will continue to evolve the product and get a sense of user behavior over time -- which has been a hallmark of the company over the years.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates DealProfiles.com.

Visit a college campus and it's obvious that the MySpace generation can't live without mobile devices. And, of course, they want smart devices that are sleek and cool.

No doubt, this is a big opportunity for Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), which needs to find new markets for its software.

So, today the company announced it is purchasing Danger, which has a platform that helps to deliver mobile applications.

The company focuses primarily on the T-Mobile Sidekick family. Some of the capabilities include: IM, real-time email, HTML browsing and social networking. There are about 923,000 subscribers and revenues hit $56.4 million last year.

A big problem: over 90% of revenues come from T-Mobile. That's certainly a risky proposition.

Interestingly enough, Danger recently filed for a public offering. But in light of the recent market turbulence, a deal with Microsoft certainly seems less dangerous for shareholders.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates DealProfiles.com.

While the mobile space is huge, it's still not easy to penetrate. Yet, with only $2 million in angel funding over the past couple years, Ringleader has done quite well. The company has put together a sophisticated online advertising network, which helps with mobile ads (as well as those on the desktop). Some of its customers include Best Western, Absolut and Blu-Ray.

Well, now Ringleader has some more juice. That is, the company has raised $6 million from W2 Group, which is a global marketing services company.

"Growth is ramping in mobile ads," said Bob Walczak, the CEO of Ringleader, in an interview with me. He points out that in 2005, the typical ad purchase was a paltry $5,000 to $10,000 per campaign. But, as of last year, it increased to $50,000 to $100,000. "Going into 2008," said Walczak, "we are seeing proposals for seven figures."

There are some big drivers, such as Google (NASDAQ: GOOG)'s Android platform and Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL)'s iPhone. But perhaps the biggest key is that mobile ads tend to get results. "We are seeing click-through rates of 2% to 3%," said Walczak. "This compares to a traditional web ad that gets 0.1%."

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates DealProfiles.com.