As noted by the BBC today marks the 40th anniversary of the first mobile phone call. The first call was made by Martin Cooper, a Motorola engineer, to a rival, Dr Joel Engel, at Bell Labs on April 3rd 1973. The prototype phone used for the call, which had 30 minutes of talk time and took 10 hours to recharge, weighed 1.1 kg and was 22.86 x 12.7 x 4.4 cm in size.

Here's the story of the first call, courtesy of cellular.co.za:

While he was a project manager at Motorola in 1973, Cooper set up a base station in New York with the first working prototype of a cellular telephone, the Motorola Dyna-Tac. After some initial testing in Washington for the F.C.C., Mr. Cooper and Motorola took the phone technology to New York to show the public.

On April 3, 1973, standing on a street near the Manhattan Hilton, Mr. Cooper decided to attempt a private call before going to a press conference upstairs in the hotel. He picked up the 2-pound Motorola handset called the Dyna-Tac and pushed the "off hook" button. 

The phone came alive, connecting Mr. Cooper with the base station on the roof of the Burlington Consolidated Tower (now the Alliance Capital Building) and into the land-line system. To the bewilderment of some passers-by, he dialed the number and held the phone to his ear.

Best selling mobile phone?

According to a list compiled by The Telegraph the best selling mobile phone to date is the Nokia 1101, which was launched in 2005, and eventually sold more than 250 million units. Nokia devices occupy nine out of the top ten best selling mobile phones, with the Motorola RAZR V3 being the one non-Nokia device.

The best selling smartphone to date is the Symbian powered Nokia 5230, which was launched in 2010, with eventual sales of around 150 million units. The 5230 also number four on the the mobile phone list. You can read our original review of the Nokia 5230 here.