EUROPE – T-Mobile has announced it will use Google’s web search engine as the starting point for surfing the net on its mobile phones. T-Mobile, Deutsche Telekom’s mobile arm, is Europe’s second-largest provider and has been preparing to make the move to provide full internet access on its phones. The partnership with Google is expected to give them a substantial edge.”With the Google home page, we want tell our customers from the first moment that they are carrying with them the internet they know from home,” said T-Mobile board member Ulli Gritzuhn at a news conference in T-Mobile’s Bonn, Germany, headquarters.

For years, mobile providers have failed to convince subscribers to use their phones for more than phone calls and text messaging. The vast majority of mobile phone users shun mobile internet services, and those who do use them do so seldomly. Customer surveys indicate that users don’t see the use in such sites as T-Mobile’s “t-zones” and market leader Vodafone’s “Live.”

“Too expensive, too complicated, too little use — that’s our clients’ judgment about our current data services,” said T-Mobile’s Gritzuhn.

T-Mobile expects that by mimicking the internet more closely as people are accustomed to from their home or work computer, mobile users will more readily adapt to using their phones to read the news or follow eBay auctions while on the go.

The T-Mobile internet campaign, dubbed “Web’n’walk,” also features the launch of mobile devices with larger displays better-suited to the web, as well as an offer of cheaper tariffs to encourage internet usage, Gritzuhn said.

Web’n’walk will launch in Germany and Austria in July, and later this year in Britain, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic. No decision has been made yet as to whether T-Mobile will use Google as a home page in the United States as well.