The underdog Danish voiceover IP (VoIP) company Vopium has received a large cash injection from a prominent Indian telecommunications investor and has declared it is gunning for Skype in a bid to compete with the frontrunning VoIP provider.

Vopium, sometimes dubbed the 'other' VoIP company, today announced that Indian investor Raghuvinder Kataria, an early backer of Bharti Airtel – the third largest in-country mobile operator in the world – would invest $16.5m (£11m) in the Danish internet telecom, making him its largest shareholder.

In a statement, Kataria said: "We believe that the market demands an alternative mobile solution to Skype and the fast market penetration of smartphones opens up new and more intelligent ways of communication."

Kataria's investment significantly increases Vopium's funding as their last posted investment was €4.2m (£3.5m) in 2008 from Enex Group SA, a private Luxembourg-based investment company.

But the little VoIP still has a long way to go before it catches up with Skype, the field's clear leader.

At peak hours, Skype reports 23 million users online and Skype traffic accounts for 12% of global international calling minutes. Its users made 3.1bn minutes of calls to landlines and mobiles, and 36.1bn minutes of calls between Skype users in the third quarter of 2009.

Vopium, on the other hand, has a total of one million users with 10,000 of them online at peak hours. Last year, Vopium reported 40m-50m minutes of calls during the whole of last year.

But at reported growth of 30% every month, Vopium could well be on track to become a real challenge to Skype's hegemony.

Vopium was founded in 2006 by Pakistani entrepreneur Tanveer Sharif. Users download software to their mobile phone, which then re-routes calls over the internet. It was initially founded to allow cheap calling to Pakistan, India and Bangladesh but launched throughout the world last year.

This girl is getting sick of technology...

5. Your cell phone can set you on Fire

Probably one of the last things you want your phone to do is spontaneously combust, especially if it’s in your pocket or, you know, against your head. For the most part we like to think there are hard working men and woman out there ensuring that the products we use from day to day just don’t do that. And while most things are pretty safe, very few things are 100%

Back in 2004, a teen in California was walking with her phone in her back pocket when, as witnesses say, it made a woosh sound, bulged a little, then spewed forth fist-sized flames. The girl suffered 2^nd degree burns.

So how could such a nutty thing happen? An overheated battery. Kyocera issues a recall of 140,000 batteries and the Consumer Product Safety Commission has issued recalls as well for certain batteries that can short circuit, overheat and, yes, burst into flame.

There have been other reported incident of phones bursting into flames while charging as well and though it’s rare, it actually can happen, though it seems to have been the result of poor quality batteries more than your phone angry at the poor grammar used in texting as you might think

6. Your phone can spy on you

This one has been a favorite of conspiracy nuts for the last few years, the idea that the government can tap into your phone and use it to track your whereabouts, or ever turn on the microphone and listen in on your conversations, whether or not you’re using the phone at that moment.

In fact, it’s true that the FBI has used this technique, calling “roving bug” to eavesdrop on criminals, like in New York when it was used as a surveillance tool in an organized crime investigation. Traditional wire tapping of land lines is a bit too old school and criminals are on to it, so the FBI had to adapt. Since many phones will never fully power down unless the battery is totally removed, a cell phone is a perfect wireless transmitter for law enforcement to tap into, and it still falls under the purview of existing wiretapping laws.

In other cases, though judges are have batted the attempts down due to a lack of probably cause, law enforcement has attempted to get access to information about cell phone use – locations of cell towers that took calls from individuals, strength and angle of signal and timing of calls, which would allow them to approximate the location of an individual. You’ve seen it in television and movies before and, for all intents and purposes, it’s fairly accurate. With access to cell company records, you could be tracked in real time based on your cell phone usage, or even just having the phone on and in your possession.

7. Your cell phone can explode

If you’re the kind of person who figures a cell phone fire is no big deal, you may be more inclined to be slightly nervous of cell phone explosions. After all, fire can be our friend and let us roast weenies and such. Explosions just suck, by and large.

Back in 2007, word came out of Korea that a man who had his cell phone in his shirt pocket died when the phone blew up, sending shrapnel into his heart and lungs. Last year in China, a man died shortly after changing his phone battery when the same thing happened. It was the 9^th recorded phone explosion in the country over a seven year period.

In one incident, a man working in an iron mill died when it was determined that the heat of the mill caused the liquid in the battery to overheat and blow up. So it may be rare, but it can happen. Let that be a lesson to you, never expose your phone to molten metal.

8. Cell phones cause infertility

Potentially the most horrible rumor of all, at least for some people, is the one that says cell phones lower your sperm count. And apparently it’s true.

Research conducted at the Center for Reproductive Medicine at the Glickman Urological and Kidney Institute at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio suggests that there’s a chance using a cell phone is bad news for your boys if you’re the hands free type who keeps the phone in your pocket. Long term exposure to all that electromagnetic radiation so close to the goods may lead to an increase in body temperature. And that can effect sperm count as well as mobility and shape.

The jury’s not out, of course, and odds are you need to be doing a lot of talking with the phone in your pocket, but probably to be on the safe side you could keep the phone over a couple of inches or two. You never know.