The inventor of the first modern portable handset is Dr Martin Cooper, who was the general manager for the systems division at Motorola at that time. In 1973, Dr Cooper made the first call on a portable cell phone. He called his rival Joel Engel, head of research at Bell Labs, to give him the latest news on how the competition between them was turning out. The picture on left represents him and his first mobile phone.
The first commercial handheld cellular phone was launched by Motorola in 1983, and weighed 28 ounces. The device could be purchased for a price of ‘only’ $3,995!
In the 1990s, 2G mobile system appeared, such as GSM, IS-136, iDEN and IS-95. Along with the new way of information transmitting, a new trend of small 100–200g handheld devices started replacing the brick-sized phones. The change could be made thanks to technology advancement, which included smaller batteries and more energy-efficient electronics. Above it’s a picture of Nokia 100, the company’s first major cell phone product, which was a 1G phone.
In 1995, Nokia 2110 was the first mobile phone in the world to use vibrations, had dimensions of 148 x 56 x 25 mm and a weight of 236g. A year later, its older relative, the 6110, was the first phone to have ‘Snake’ installed.
In 1999, the same Nokia launches 7110, the first terminal with WAP, permitting Internet access directly from the phone. This one had pretty much the same dimensions and weight as the 2110, and had another new feature: an Infrared port. In the same year, Nokia also launched one of the most popular mobile phones in the world: the 3310.
In 2007, Apple first introduced the iPhone in US, which is an Internet-enabled multimedia mobile phone with functions such as virtual keyboard and buttons, multi-touch screen and all the functions of a regular camera phone and iPod.
The third generation of mobile phones and standards is 3G, a service that enables video conversations, broadband wireless data and others from cell phones. After successfully integrating the 3G technology into mobile phones, Apple released the 3G iPhone.
The operating system (OS) that runs all your programs and allows you to easily interact with your PC is called Windows for a good reason. 
An artist's conception of Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo (vehicle in bottom of image) as it is released from its mothership WhiteknightTwo is pictured in this undated handout photograph from Virgin Galactic.
