RCOM & Nokia join hands for a first-of-its-kind multi-faceted business partnership

Mr. Mahesh Prasad, President, Reliance Communications &
Mr. V Ramnath, Director - Operator Channels, Nokia India

Launch Nokia’s Ovi Life Tools a personalised service to plug information gaps in the areas of Agriculture and Education
Jointly promote mobile services & data usage across customer segments

o Special subsidized packages including bundled offer of Reliance Netconnect Broadband+ Datacard to download unlimited music from Ovi Music Unlimited devices at a faster speed

o Exclusive data packages across a range of Nokia GPRS phones

NEW DELHI - August 20, 2010: Reliance Communications, India’s largest integrated telecom operator and Nokia India today jointly announced a first-of-its-kind multi-faceted business alliance. The RCOM – Nokia alliance will aim to foster greater use of mobile services, giving consumers an opportunity to get richer experiences and do more with their phones.

The RCOM–Nokia partnership is structured on a one-of-its-kind blue-print to engage with the Indian consumes to offer an array of unmatched & innovative mobile, data and services offerings in India.

The business partnership with Nokia is in line with the multitude of innovations lined-up by the two companies to take mobility to the next level. The alliance covers –

Commenting on its relationship with Nokia, Mr Vrajesh Shelat, Head – Wireless Data Services & Alliances, Reliance Communications said, “In the last two quarters, there has been a significant adoption of smartphones by Indian consumers. We have seen the sales of smartphones on our Network increase manifold. With the rollout of 3G, we see a huge opportunity in fostering a mutually beneficial business relationship to offer customers unique Voice, data as well as VAS innovations with Nokia.”

Mr V Ramnath, Director – Operator Channels, Nokia India said, “To take mobility to the next level, Nokia is moving beyond products to add services like Ovi Life Tools and Ovi Music Unlimited on its devices. These services have the potential to positively impact livelihoods at one hand and provide entertainment platforms to our consumers at the other. Our association with Reliance Communications is an important step in the direction of creating a strong ecosystem that will take these services to a larger consumer base.”

Ovi Life Tools, a range of innovative and personalized services covering Agriculture, Education and Entertainment targeted at both urban and rural consumers will be an integral component of this RCOM & Nokia alliance. The two companies will jointly create an enabling environment to address the information gaps in rural & semi-urban India by making available Ovi Life Tools for Reliance users.

Reliance will offer Ovi Life Tools services in two versions, Subscription and Pay per Use. While the Subscription Service for education and entertainment services will be offered at Rs.30/Month and the agriculture service at Rs.60/Month. The Pay-per-Use will be priced at Rs.3/Request.

Mobile Music has become increasingly popular among the Indian consumers. According to some estimates close to 40% young people prefer to listen to music on their mobile phones. To make it easier for consumers, RCOM GSM customers can download music upto 12GB data usage (approximately 2400 songs) from Nokia’s breakthrough music service – Ovi Music Unlimited (OMU) using Nokia’s OMU-enabled phones including Nokia 5530, Nokia 5800, Nokia X6 16 GB, Nokia X6 8 GB and Nokia 5235. Consumers can also purchase Reliance Netconnect Broadband+ Datacards at an exclusive price of Rs. 1999/- along with the purchase of Nokia OMU-enabled devices.

Ovi Music Unlimited comprises of over 40 lakh legal tracks from across 19 genres including Rock, Rap, Hip Hop, Pop, Bollywood, Sufi, Indipop, Indian Classical, Devotional, Ghazals, Malayalam, Tamil, Gujarati, Bengali, Punjabi and Bhojpuri,amongst others. Consumers who buy a Nokia Ovi Music Unlimited enabled device are able to download millions of tracks for free, direct to their mobile phone or to their PC from the Ovi Music Store for 12 months.

As part of this alliance, RCOM is also offering mobile data bundle of 1.2GB on Nokia GPRS enabled handsets (other than the OMU-enabled phones). In addition, RCOM is offering up to 1800 free on-net minutes bundled with Nokia 1800. These free voice minutes and mobile data bundles has a validity of six months.

Reliance Communications Limited founded by the late Shri Dhirubhai H Ambani (1932-2002) is the flagship company of the Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group. The Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group currently has a net worth in excess of Rs. 64,000 crore (US$ 13.6 billion), cash flows of Rs. 13,000 crore (US$ 2.8 billion), net profit of Rs. 8,400 crore (US$ 1.8 billion).

Reliance Communications is India's foremost and truly integrated telecommunications service provider. The Company, with a customer base of over 117 million including over 2.5 million individual overseas retail customers, ranks among the Top 5 Telecom companies in the world by number of customers in a single country. Reliance Communications corporate clientele includes 2,100 Indian and multinational corporations, and over 800 global, regional and domestic carriers.

Reliance Communications has established a pan-India, next generation, integrated (wireless and wireline), convergent (voice, data and video) digital network that is capable of supporting best-of-class services spanning the entire communications value chain, covering over 24,000 towns and 600,000 villages. Reliance Communications owns and operates the world's largest next generation IP enabled connectivity infrastructure, comprising over 190,000 kilometers of fibre optic cable systems in India, USA, Europe, Middle East and the Asia Pacific region.

At Nokia, we are committed to connecting people. We combine advanced technology with personalized services that enable people to stay close to what matters to them. Every day, more than 1.2 billion people connect to one another with a Nokia device – from mobile phones to advanced smartphones and high-performance mobile computers. Today, Nokia is integrating its devices with innovative services through Ovi (www.ovi.com), including music, maps, apps, email and more. Nokia's NAVTEQ is a leader in comprehensive digital mapping and navigation services, while Nokia Siemens Networks provides equipment, services and solutions for communications networks globally.