Paegas to expand its offer of WAP services

• Paegas expanded its offer of WAP enabled phones in the Czech Republic: Nokia 7110 and Motorola Timeport P7389, other phones of various brands will enter the market in spring
• Only with Paegas WAP may you also use the Paegas Info Profil service to find out, for instance, the amount on the last phone bill invoice on the day of its issuance
• Motorola Timeport P7389 is sold at a discounted price of CZK 7,499; Nokia 7110 at a price of CZK 11,999

Starting mid-February, WAP (Wireless Application Protocol)-enabled mobile phones owners may take advantage of a wide range of services accessible via this technology. RadioMobil has thus further expanded the capabilities which the general public was able to test at the Invex trade fair at the beginning of last October. As early as the middle of last year, the Paegas network operator, as one of the first in the world, introduced pilot versions of WAP-based services.

"We follow the developments in the GSM world very closely and we try to determine whether these new technologies will succeed on the Czech market. We have managed to achieve this so far - the SMS service and other services based on the short text message transmission, SIM Toolkit, and Internet telephony prove this," said Tereza Kakosová, spokeswoman for RadioMobil, and she added: "Some operators buy the technology and install it; we use the technology only as a basis upon which to build a whole range of services attractive for our customers. Another of our successes was WAP, for which we have been developing applications beginning the middle of last year, when for the first time we introduced functional WAP applications."

The WAP technology may be, in a simplified manner, likened to web pages, as it is something like a gateway providing access to various services prepared by an operator or another company. Unlike web pages, which are displayed on larger screens, WAP has to allow for output on small mobile phone displays. Therefore it is geared towards textual information.

Thanks to the WAP standard option, RadioMobil customers may view the Teletext, operate their e-mail accounts by using the POP3 protocol directly from their mobile phones, shop or find out the amount of the last invoice for Paegas services. In addition, thanks to co-operation with the Czech Press Agency (CTK), Czech daily press is available on the mobile phone display offering up-to-date real time CTK news, conveniently sorted into domestic, international, and sports sections. Traffic information is supplied by Mobilpress Servis. The Centrum.cz portal application supplies useful information from company databases and press monitoring. English language courses are another very attractive option. This is a unique WAP LangMaster Re-wise system developed specifically for these purposes by EPA LLC. Private Investors, the largest trader in foreign U.S. securities in the Czech Republic, prepared an informative page under the WAP standard where investors may view current developments on the U.S. stock exchange markets from their mobile phones.

The WAP technology offers a wide range of applications. We may therefore expect its wide expansion, equivalent to that of the Internet. Moreover, no computer is necessary to use WAP-based services: all you need is a GSM telephone supporting the new technology. At the moment, these telephones include Nokia 7110 and Motorola Timeport P7389, although other mobile phone manufacturers should soon follow. In the second half of this year, WAP should appear on lower category mobile phones, and starting next year, almost all new devices will uniformly support the WAP technology. The Motorola Timeport P7389 mobile phone is sold at a discounted price of CZK 7,449 and Nokia 7110 at CZK 11,999. RadioMobil is therefore the only Czech operator offering two WAP-enabled phones and, moreover, one at the discounted price.

Apart from owning a suitable device, the subscriber needs to activate the data services to be able to use WAP. If connected within the Paegas WAP service, the subscriber pays a flat rate of CZK 2/minute, charged in 30 second intervals. Information therefore may be obtained for one crown.

"The Paegas WAP service will acquire a new dimension with the launching of the GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) technology which RadioMobil has already purchased and is implementing in the Paegas network at the moment," Tereza Kakosová commented.

RadioMobil, a joint-stock company, operates the GSM network called Paegas. The GSM Paegas network now covers over 99% of Czech population. Users may operate the GSM Paegas mobile phones in the networks of 168 operators from almost 80 countries worldwide. At the end of 1999, more than 875,000 customers were using the services of the GSM Paegas network, into which RadioMobil invested CZK 6 billion in the course of 1999, which is one billion more than the other operator. By acquiring more than 500,000 new customers in the course of 1999, Paegas became number one on the Czech market in number of acquisitions.

T-Mobile Czech Republic, a member of the international telecommunications group Deutsche Telekom, has almost 6.2 million customers, the number-one operator in the Czech market. T-Mobile is an integrated operator: in addition to telecommunications services, it offers comprehensive ICT solutions not only for companies, but also for other organizations and individuals. It provides outstanding services in the high-speed network, which was proved repeatedly by benchmark testing performed by umlaut (former P3) with Best-in-Test seal.

T-Mobile Czech Republic places emphasis on taking a responsible approach to the environment and society. It adheres to fair business practices, helps beneficial applications and services to see the light of day, supports non-profit organizations, small businesses and individuals, and lends a helping hand whenever crisis situations arise. The company’s employees serve as volunteers in many places across the entire Czech Republic.

More information about the company is available at www.t-mobile.cz, www.t-press.cz (the portal for journalists) and www.t-mobile.cz/pomahame (information on the company’s CSR activities).

Contact details of the press unit: press@t-press.cz.