Crikey, here's something we haven't seen lately - some good news from Vodafone.

In recent weeks the mobile giant has been plagued by rumours of infighting, power struggles, boardroom rifts, conspiracies and all round nastiness. Lifetime president Sir Christopher Gent denied he had anything to do with a plot against boss Arun Sarin insisting that he did not "interfere with the company and obstruct current management" adding that any such allegations were "without foundation".

Despite this, he resigned his honorary role as life president with the following words: "When I was an executive at Vodafone, relationships within the company and at board level were characterised by openness and trust. We were mercifully free of company politics and blame culture."

The speculation about how Vodafone is being run came on top of its announcement that it expects to take a massive hit of between £23bn and £28bn following the revaluation of its assets.

Which makes today's "good news" all the more important. 'Cos the cellco's announced...wait for it...that 10 million punters are now using its Vodafone Live! video phone service. When launched back in November 2004 Voda predicted that it would have more than 10 million punters by the end of March 2006. Well, with a few weeks still to go the cellco says it's hit its target.

"This is an important milestone for Vodafone and I am very pleased that we have achieved our target ahead of time," said Voda boss Sarin. Which is nice. Very nice indeed. ®