Nokia to Supply GPRS Network and WAP Solution to Mobilix in Denmark.

Business &Technology

HELSINKI, Finland--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 2, 2000

Nokia has signed an agreement to supply the Danish operator Mobilix with a complete GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) network.

The deal includes the entire GPRS network, including core network infrastructure, Base Station Subsystem and a full range of customer services. Deliveries have already begun.

As part of the deal, Nokia will also supply a WAP Gateway extension to the Nokia Artus Messaging Platform. Messaging Platform is a comprehensive platform for WAP and messaging applications over a variety of bearers including SMS, USSD and GPRS. Mobilix already has the Nokia Artus SMS Center in use, and to compliment it, with this deal they will also be supplied with the Nokia Artus USSD Center, an application platform for offering interactive messaging services.

&uot;The Nokia GPRS solution is a natural step in expanding Mobilix' wireless data services and is essential to the evolution of 3rd Generation networks,&uot; says Gilles Lamberty, the Technical Director of Mobilix, &uot;Nokia's GPRS solution enables us to make use of IP connectivity to deliver a variety of new innovative applications for our customers.&uot;

&uot;Nokia is pleased to further strengthen its relationship with Mobilix, having supplied both GSM and fixed network infrastructure since 1997,&uot; said Steen Boas Andersen, Managing Director, Nokia Networks, Denmark. &uot;Nokia's GPRS has integrated best in class technology solutions to provide among the most secure connections to the Internet on the market.

GPRS brings IP based, packet switched connections to the GSM network, allowing faster and easier Internet access to the mobile mass market. It also serves as an ideal bearer for WAP based applications.

Mobilix will deploy a GPRS system comprising of the Nokia SGSN, (Serving GPRS Support Node) Nokia GGSN (Gateway GPRS Support Node), Charging Gateway and IP backbone components necessary for GPRS deployment.

Mobilix is Denmark's dynamic telecommunications company aiming at becoming the preferred global supplier of the residential and business sectors of telecommunications services. Mobilix offers competitive products and services within mobile telephony, fixed telephony, data and Internet and has its own Danish backbone network which is at the basis for the offers for competitive prices of fixed telephony and data services. Mobilix is a 54% owned company by one of the world's most important telecom companies, France Telecom, as well as five financial institutions - GE Capital Structure Finance Group of the US (SFG), PAI (Paribas Affairis Industrielle), PART'COM (Group Caisse de Depots), Capital Communications CDPQ Inc. of Canada and MEDIATEL CAPITAL- which together hold 32%, and by Banestyrelsen by 14%. (www.mobilix.dk)

Nokia is paving the way to the mobile information society with its innovative products and solutions. Nokia is the leading mobile phone supplier and a leading supplier of mobile, fixed and IP networks, related services as well as multimedia terminals. In 1999, net sales totaled EUR 19.8 billion (USD 19.9 billion). Headquartered in Finland, Nokia is listed on the New York (NOK), Helsinki, Stockholm, London, Frankfurt and Paris stock exchanges and employs more than 55 000 people.

Notes to Editors:

As with Short Message Service (SMS), Unstructured Supplementary Services Data (USSD) uses the signalling channel as the bearer. However, while SMS needs to have a channel reserved for every message, USSD is session-orientated. This means that when a user accesses a USSD service, a session is established and the radio connection stays open until it is released by the user, application, or time out. Response times for interactive applications are shorter than with SMS, because there is no channel reservation time per message and there is no &uot;store and forward&uot; delay.

However, USSD does not compete with SMS, but complements it. With Nokia Artus Messaging Platform, subscribers can be offered easy access to information available on the Internet. Possible USSD services include headline news, sports results, exchange rates, banking transactions and stock market quotes. Nokia Artus USSD Center will support the Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) to provide the GSM network with a fast bearer for easy-to-use WAP services.