Apple with their iPhone and Google with Android have led the way in mobile phone applications for some time now but according to an article over on The Guardian, the world’s biggest mobile phone networks which serve more than 4 billion customers are mounting a fightback.

A new business which will create a single worldwide market for downloadable mobile phone apps will have its headquarters in London UK and will enable mobile phone companies to cash in on the craze of the mobile app, and apparently by the year’s end the companies will be in position to deliver to app developers a single standard which will operate across multiple platforms from BlackBerry to LG and Samsung.

Apparently the reason the new business came about was due to Google launching their own branded smartphone the Nexus One which they say is the first in a portfolio of smartphones that it has total control over.

During MWC 2010 it was announced by a group of more than a dozen mobile handset companies including Orange, O2 and Vodafone that their intention was to form the Wholesale Applications Community that will work on a single platform for applications which will work over all their networks and a varying range of handsets.

The Wholesale Application Community has now gained 40 members and is to merge with the industry body known as Open Mobile Terminal Platform which is backed by 9 operators including Nokia, Ericsson, Orange, AT&T and Telecom Italia.

WAC is presently looking to appoint a chairman with a view to holding the first board meeting in July, and the first task will be to select a technology platform from the competing open standards, and it is understood that the open platform which is currently under construction by the Joint Innovation Lab partnership which partners include Verizon Wireless, Vodafone, China Mobile and Softbank and is also supported by Sharp, Samsung, LG and BlackBerry maker Research In Motion.