ATHENS, Greece, Oct. 25, 2000 — Today Cosmote, one of Greece’s major mobile wireless operators, and Microsoft Corp. announced the launch of a new wireless Internet e-mail service, based on Microsoft’s standards-based, flexible, end-to-end mobile Internet e-mail solution. This new service can bring Internet e-mail to more Greeks than currently receive it since about 17.5 percent of the country’s 10.5 million people own a Cosmote mobile phone that would be able to access the service, while only about 5 percent can now access Internet e-mail via a PC connection.
Cosmote will be among the first wireless carriers worldwide to deploy the latest version of the Microsoft® Internet Cellular Smart Access (ICSA) e-mail server, which will provide a full range of easy-to-use Internet e-mail services accessible not only over fixed line Web connections and WAP mobile devices, but also through regular mobile phones using Short Message Services. In addition to providing the technology, Microsoft will jointly market the service with Cosmote in Greece.
“With the launch of MyCosmos e-mail service, we aim to offer our customers an affordable and easy to use e-mail service that they can access both through any PC Internet connection and any mobile device that they may have,”
said Evangelos Martigopoulos, chief executive officer of Cosmote.
“In that respect, Microsoft has provided the scalable technology and the rapid deployment capability to quickly bring this service to our customers. We are happy that Microsoft is one of the important partners of Cosmote, and we shall further pursue such cooperations.”
“We believe that the Cosmote mobile e-mail service can play a key role in providing access to Internet e-mail to a wide range of the population in Greece where the penetration of mobile phones is much higher than the penetration of PC-based access to the Internet,”
said Hjalmar Winbladh, general manager of the Mobility Solution Center at Microsoft in Europe, the Middle East and Asia (EMEA).
“Our joint marketing of the service with Cosmote is an example of how we can cooperate with dynamic wireless carriers to rapidly bring to market advanced mobile solutions in developing markets,”
said Yannis Rondiris, general manager of Microsoft in Greece.
Subscribers to Cosmote will be able to use the MyCosmos e-mail service to set up a mailbox that allows them to receive and send e-mail messages on multiple devices — mobile phone, Pocket PC device or PC — using a wireless e-mail service based on the Microsoft ICSA e-mail server. Subscribers can customize the service to set filters and rules on how they are notified of new incoming messages. The MyCosmos e-mail service has been designed for ease of use and includes many advanced features designed especially for mobile e-mail access. Among such features is a
“smart reply”
capability provided by the Microsoft software that lets subscribers reply to an incoming e-mail message with the push of a button from any Short Message Service without having to enter the e-mail address of the recipient.
About Cosmote
Cosmote launched its services in April 1998, becoming the third cellular and the only GSM1800 operator in Greece. It is a subsidiary of the Greek National Telecommunications Organization OTE (70 percent) and TELENOR of Norway (30 percent). On Sept. 30, 2000, Cosmote had a 32.6 percent market share in Greece, corresponding to over 1,762,000 customers, and was the leader in contract customers, with almost 1,031,000 subscribers. Cosmote has over 1,700 base stations nationwide with 98 percent population coverage in Greece and has recently acquired 85 percent of the only Albanian mobile telephony company, AMC.
About Microsoft
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq
“MSFT”
) is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people through great software — any time, any place and on any device.
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