Telefonica has launched a ‘virtual mobile number service’ in Spain, providing further momentum for the nascent cloud market and giving a boost to local startup vendor fonYou. The operator is calling the service (which gives customers a second mobile phone number on their existing phone and SIM card) ‘Second Line.’ A statement from fonYou claims the service will give Spanish customers “access to a new range of cloud-based ‘over-the-top’ services such as visual voicemail, real-time call register and advanced filtering and blocking functions for incoming calls.”

There is growing interest in the link between ‘the cloud’ and mobile telephony, with the subject being the centre of much debate at last month’s Mobile World Congress. For fonYou, the deal marks its first win at a tier one operator, following January’s contract at South African carrier Cell C. “[Mobile operators] know that they must not leave this field open to new and challenging competitors such as Google Voice or Skype,” claimed fonYou CEO Fernando Nunez-Mendoza in a statement. “They must get involved and compete themselves.”