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March 1 2006

Ericsson (NASDAQ:ERICY) and the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation
(NRK) conduct the world's first live trial of interactive mobile TV.

The trial demonstrates a new way of using mobile TV, which allows mobile phone users to vote, chat and communicate with a television presenter while watching their favorite show - all at the same time and all on their mobile.

Together, Ericsson and NRK launched a downloadable client for the existing interactive TV format, Svisj. For example, viewers can vote for which music video is to be played next by the touch of a button and may also chat with each other or the host of the program.

Gunnar Garfors, Director of Mobile Services, NRK Development Division, says: "This is interactivity with a vengeance. We are making it easier for our audiences to view mobile TV and participate in shows, no matter where they are."

Kurt Sillén, Vice President, Ericsson Mobility World, says: "Our solution makes it possible for viewers to interact with a show that they are watching on their mobile device in a whole new way, creating a much richer TV experience with the help of the mobile channel."

The new interactive mobile TV application is an end-to-end solution based on existing technology, which enables mobile phone users to watch streamed TV programs live and at the same time interact with the show.

For TV networks, this means increased traffic and new revenues from content fees, additional advertising and paid interactions such as voting, chatting and greetings. This opens the way to new TV formats, widens target groups and builds customer loyalty while giving end-users an advanced and enhanced TV experience

Ericsson offers Mobile TV with easy channel selection

Ericsson (NASDAQ:ERICY) enables easy channel surfing for Mobile TV by introducing a client software that offers an attractive channel selector for mobile handsets. The new channel selector offers the quickest channel switching on the market and easy access to a list of available channels.

As Mobile TV is quickly becoming an important subscriber service, this facilitates operators to generate new revenues in addition to existing services. Mobile operators and media companies all over the world are today introducing Mobile TV services, in form of schedule based TV channels as well as on-demand TV programs.

Studies from Ericsson Consumer and Enterprise Lab show that the average time spent on watching each mobile TV program will be shorter compared to traditional TV. Therefore a fast channel switching mechanism is of great importance to enable a swift zapping between channels.

The channel selector provides a familiar and easy experience for the consumer as the handset can be used similar to how channels are switched with a remote control. When switching to a new channel via the Ericsson Mobile TV client the channel is visible on the mobile screen in less than 3 seconds. The Mobile TV client that Ericsson provides is a white label client that can be customized to represent the service provider's brand.

The Ericsson Mobile TV solution enables operators a true end-to-end solution utilizing the mobile networks, WCDMA and GSM/EDGE, for commercial Mobile TV services. Mobile technologies will provide high quality and cost efficient Mobile TV for any level of penetration.
Today mobile networks are distributing Mobile TV via unicast. As Mobile TV becomes a mass-market service the mobile networks will have broadcast capabilities referred to as MBMS (Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Services) available.