GRAZ, Austria -- Telekom Austria won the tender for 40 of 61 partial projects by the province of Styria within the scope of it "Broadband Initiative Styria" between December 2004 and June 2005. This means that there will be an enormous improvement in the availability of broadband in the rural region.

Styrian Initiative for Broadband Future

Gerald Schöpfer, MP of the Styrian parliament: "The province of Styria is conscious of its responsibility towards the population and industry, and is investing in the future of the region with this tender offer." Due to the dynamic changes that society and industry are currently subject to, the rollout of broadband infrastructure is an important topic. Countrywide broadband rollout is imperative in order to use applications from the areas of eLearning, eHealth, eCommerce, tourism and eGovernment sensibly and without long waiting times.

From Infrastructure to Application

Telekom Austria COO Rudolf Fischer welcomes the broadband initiative as a clear and affirmative sign by the Styrian provincial government for the population and industry. Currently, Telekom Austria is providing broadband Internet to Styrian households in primarily urban areas. Provision will be increased to 85% (Telekom Austria infrastructure) in 2006 by the rollout.

Rudolf Fischer, at today's press conference in Graz: "Following intensive rollout of broadband infrastructure, the development of the respective applications is next on our agenda." After making broadband entertainment an important feature of the Telekom Austria portal www.aon.atwith services such as the aonMusicdownload, the aonFotobuch or www.aon.tv, Telekom Austria is now developing additional applications to do justice to the trend in interactive and user-generated content.

Particularly applications in the area of business, health, tourism and administration require broadband more than ever. Thus, rollout is strongly geared to Styria as a business location. The President of the Styrian Chamber of Commerce, Peter Mühlbacher, is in favor of the clear trend towards more bandwidth for business applications:" Even with small and medium-sized enterprises, broadband is becoming increasingly necessary for successful business. Therefore, we welcome the initiative by the provincial government."

Telekom Austria as Partner of Regional Industry

In his role as Telekom Austria's Regional Head of Styria, Gerhard Mayer emphasizes the far-reaching importance of functional and well-developed broadband infrastructure. Since launching broadband in 1999 to the end of 2004, in Styria alone Telekom Austria invested roughly 174 million euros in infrastructure for ADSL broadband. The high costs were primarily for upgrading the switching centers, which had to be equipped with special equipment to make an ADSL broadband access line out of a traditional telephone line.

Telekom Austria is one of the largest companies in Styria, with 1,255 employees. With the Styrian municipal server, which offers a user-friendly platform to communities for their Internet presence, Telekom Austria also shows its competence as technology leader on the regional level.

Telekom Austria AG