In this morning’s keynote, Vodafone (NYSE: VOD) CEO Arun Sarin said he has the ability to see trends worldwide in the mobile industry because Vodafone covers 30 countries and 250 million customers, from America, through its ownership position in Verizon (NYSE: VZ), to Britain, Romania and Turkey.

He said the difference between today and three years is the development of the mobile Internet: “Internet on the mobile is the new new thing in the industry, and it’s happening now.” Vodafone sees data revenues growing by 40 percent and that’s on a base of revenues of $4 billion. “Our customers want to take content and applications from their home and office PCs to the mobile devices. Customers expect us to deliver mobile Internet that’s similar to a PC environment. They want us to design an Internet service for the mobile world. Mobile can become the main method of accessing Internet in society, and more so in developing countries than in developed countries.”

Sarin outlined three objectives for the industry:

—The UI must be easy and simple to use, and there must be attractive devices that are suitable for the Internet, meaning high-resolution screens, long battery life, and touchscreens. Content has to span from bite-sized chunks of content to full-access TV.

—The industry must reduce the number of operating systems “for the benefit of our customers, whether it’s Symbian, Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT), Android or Linux.” The networks need to be standardized. He said Vodafone and Verizon Wireless will coverage on the LTE technology path. He said WiMax needs to find its own place. “What we have to learn from decades of experience that we need a common standard—to the extent that mobile WiMax exists, it needs to find a home in TDD.”

—Carriers must build information services, like CRM and LBS, to make the device more personal.

Some stats: Vodafone has 1.5 million mobile internet customers; 2.5 million YouTube videos have been streamed; 92 million searches conducted on mobile Google; 4 million customers signed up for a at home service that has the same prices at home as a fixed line; Mobile TV in 13 markets; digital music services with 750,000 tracks across 20 markets; 3 million 3G PC cards; and 2.5 million handheld business devices.

In conclusion, Sarin pleaded to carriers: “Do not allow our companies to sit back and become bit-pipes, it’s time to stand up and invest in our future. if we get this right, there’s an enormous upside, if we get this wrong, there will be a tremendous upside, but it will not be realized by us. The time to get this is now.”