Guess what? First cellphone call is 35 years old

Martin Cooper placed the very first public cellphone call 35 years ago.

Cooper, who is credited with inventing the portable cellphone, placed that call on April 3, 1973 while he was the general manager of Motorola's communications systems division.

Motorola recently announced the sale of its cellular handset business. Analysts speculate the company landed on hard times because it lost touch with the consumer.

The first cellphone was mammoth by today's standards—weighing two and a half pounds and 10 inches long. The phone could be used for only 20 minutes before the battery died.

Cooper together with his wife, wireless expert Arlene Harris, are founding executives of GreatCall—developer of Jitterbug, which is a cellphone without a camera, MP3 player, or Web browser. It is being touted as a cellphone that is optimum for "talking and listening".

"We created Jitterbug for those who still place value in what matters most—talking on a clear connection as part of a complete simplified service," said Harris.

Jitterbug works off simple "yes" and "no" prompts without complicated icons or menus, intuitive voice dialing and even a dial tone. The 24-hour service turns Jitterbug specific phone functions on and off so each customer gets a Jitterbug with only what they want.

- Nicolas Mokhoff
EE Times