Basking Ridge, N.J. - Verizon Wireless this week announced that it has eliminated fees associated with its mobile song ID service, which lets users identify what song is playing by holding their phone near to any speaker. The V CAST Song ID application is now available as a free download to select music-enabled phones. Subscribers may also purchase full-track versions of 1.9 million of the 4 million songs contained in the song ID database.

Oakland, Calif. - Pandora, the personalized Web radio service, announced on Wednesday that its service is now available on cell phones to Sprint subscribers.

Tel Aviv, Israel - Hingi, a developer of mobile media ID and e-commerce technology, has raised $3.5 million in an initial round of financing, led by Opus Capital and a group of unnamed investors, Globes Online reported.

Los Angeles - Napster has partnered with Motorola to offer its on-demand music subscription service across Motorola's entire line of phones that support such services. The companies will develop promotions for North America, the U.K. and Germany that include a free month of Napster To Go, and plan to explore offering bundled music at retail.

Seattle - RealNetworks, a provider of media delivery technology, announced on Wednesday that it has acquired Sony NetServices, which provides European mobile networks with digital music services, for $9 million.

Barcelona - Acquamedia Technologies, a Spain-based mobile content retailer, announced that it has launched a monthly subscription service that provides unlimited full-track mobile song downloads. The All The Latest unlimited service, which features a catalog of over 1 million tracks, will initially be available in the U.K. and Latin America, with plans to expand into additional countries later this year.

Los Angeles - Napster announced on Monday that Napster Japan -- a joint venture with Tower Records Japan -- will soon launch an over-the-air mobile music download service with NTT DoCoMo, Japan's largest wireless carrier. The service will be available on DoCoMo's new 904i series of handsets, set to ship in May, with billing to be integrated onto DoCoMo subscribers' mobile phone bills.

Tokyo - Soundbuzz, a Singapore-based digital music service, is in negotiations with major record label EMI to offer tracks free of digital rights management (DRM) for sale in Southeast Asia, Billboard reported. EMI recently broke ranks with the other major labels, announcing it would sell DRM-free tracks on iTunes and other services. The deal with Soundbuzz would reportedly include mobile downloads, a platform more popular than PC-based downloads in much of Asia. "Soundbuzz are not the only company to have approached us, and in Asia we expect this EMI initiative to generate significant activity," Paul Robinson, president and COO of EMI Music South East Asia, told Billboard.

Los Angeles - Japanese wireless carrier NTT DoCoMo plans to introduce a mobile music service in May that offers unlimited downloads to cell phones for about $17 per month, Billboard reported, citing Japan's Nikkei newspaper. However, the service will offer a more limited catalog than the network's existing pay-per-song service.

Bethel, Conn. - Mobile music distributor Global Music International (GMI) said on Wednesday that it has signed a content licensing agreement with Sony BMG, for the rights to distribute the major record label's library of music and video content in the Chinese mobile marketplace. Connecticut-based GMI recently announced a deal with China Unicom Newspace, to distribute its ringtones and other mobile media to subscribers of China Unicom, the country's second-largest carrier.

New York - BrainMedia on Wednesday introduced its music and video delivery platform for mobile devices, which is slated to go live in North America next month. Built for Qualcomm's BREW, the service will initially feature music discovery and full-track downloads, eventually expanding to include community features, dynamic radio generation and delivery of streaming and video content. New York-based BrainMedia's service is based on its Neural Encoding Model (NEM) codec, which the company says creates near CD-quality audio for ultra low bit-rate mobile distribution.

Orlando, Fla. - Wireless carrier Sprint has announced that next month it will slash the cost of full-track downloads on its mobile music service, from $2.50 each to 99 cents.

Orlando, Fla. - Clear Channel Radio, the nation's largest radio station owner, said on Tuesday that it has placed music programming from 10 of its stations on mSpot, a mobile radio service for cell phones. Palo Alto, Calif.-based mSpot's mobile music, radio and movie service also distributes content from Disney, Universal Pictures, Marketwatch and Lionsgate, via carriers including Sprint, U.S. Cellular, Telus and Bell Mobility.

Orlando, Fla. - Mercora, a provider of personalized Internet radio stations with social networking features, announced on Tuesday the launch of Mercora M v2, a new version of its service for 3G-enabled mobile phones.

Orlando, Fla. - WiderThan, a unit of RealNetworks that delivers mobile entertainment services, announced on Monday that it has signed new deals to power mobile music services for Helio and Rogers Wireless. WiderThan's Music-on-Demand platform will allow Helio Music members to download full tracks and ringback tones over-the-air to their phones. The platform will also be used by Canada's Rogers Wireless to power the company's MusicStore, which offers both a la carte and subscription-based downloads.

*This story originally contained an error and has been corrected. See below.

Davidson, N.C. - UpSnap, a provider of free mobile search and streaming mobile audio entertainment, announced on Wednesday that it has partnered with karaoke firm Sound Choice to create a mobile karaoke service. Mobile users can text "karaoke" to 27627, choose a song, and are then sent a streaming karaoke version of the song to their phones. North Carolina-based UpSnap is offering the service for free for 30 days, after which time it will cost $1.99 per month.

*This story initially said that lyrics would be sent to phones along with the audio. Sound Choice contacted DMW to inform us that lyrics are not included in the serice, only streaming karaoke versions of songs.

London - Europe's largest mobile phone retailer, Carphone Warehouse, has announced the launch of a new music download service that features more than 2.5 million tracks and is compatible with most MP3 players and mobile phones that support the Windows Media Audio format. MyMobileMusic.co.uk also features "Music Insurance," a plan that replaces customers' entire downloaded music library if their computer or MP3 player is damaged or stolen.

New York - Motorola has indefinitely delayed the release of its iRadio service, which had been in beta testing for over a year and was touted as the company's mobile radio solution, Billboard.biz reported.

New York - Mobile music downloads in Japan last year totaled 344.1 million -- up 33% --  compared with just 23 million PC-based music download sales, Billboard.biz reported, citing data from the Recording Industry Association of Japan (RIAJ).

San Francisco - The indie rock band They Might Be Giants has come up with a novel twist on the cell phone ringtone, composing original songs under 30 seconds in length that can be freely downloaded by fans, Wired reported. "We take a little sketch of a lyric or idea and make it as intense as possible," TMBG singer-songwriter John Flansburgh told Wired. "These songs are built for repeated listens." The band even composed several original "snacktones" for Wired readers, available for download from a link below.