ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates -- Emirates Telecommunications Corporation (Etisalat), and Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd jointly announced the construction of UMTS network Phase I project has been completed successfully. UMTS network has covered urban areas of all emirates. By now six thousand plus subscribers enjoy the 3G services such as Video Phone, MMS, and High-speed Wireless Surfing etc.

Etisalat's capability to quickly roll out a network has been fully demonstrated in this project. It took Etisalat only 2 months to provide 3G coverage in all emirates of U.A.E. Subsequently, Etisalat enhanced network capacity and began network optimization. Within totally less than five months the whole network construction was completed successfully. This tremendous efforts and Etisalat technical ability were clearly shown through the successful commercial launch of 3G service on 24th Dec. 2003.

Based on successful cooperation, Etisalat signed contracts of MMS and WAP Gateway with Huawei. Huawei's MMS & WAP Gateway system, as the pioneer of mobile data service in the 2.5 G and 3G era, is able to bring a wonderful world with text, image, voice & video to customers while featuring excellent interoperability, large capacity and easy expansion ability.

Mr. Ding Shaohua, Senior Vice President of Huawei Technologies and President of Huawei Middle East and North Africa Region, said, "We hope this high-quality network will benefit Etisalat with more returns. Etisalat has high efficiency of project operation and ability of fast network deployment, we are expecting a long-term strategic partnership with Etisalat through our cooperation."

Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd.

Etisalat