BBC News | BUSINESS | Firms agree mobile internet deal

BBC News Online: Business

Thursday, 2 December, 1999, 07:40 GMT

Firms agree mobile internet deal

The UK's largest internet service provider, Freeserve, has teamed up with telecoms company BT Cellnet to offer mobile internet services.

The two companies said they had signed a "strategic agreement" to work together on the development of mobile internet services in the UK.

Customers will be offered internet access to SMS text message services. This is an old technology, but both companies hope that it will soon lure a large number of users to take up advanced services using the Wireless Application Protocol (Wap), once they become available.

Users can subscribe to customised sport, entertainment, financial and enhanced e-mail services. Mobile e-commerce is planned as well.

BT Cellnet hopes to dramatically improve mobile access to the internet when it rolls out its General Packet Radio Service (GPRS), a high speed mobile internet system.

E-mail on the go

One of the first services to be made available by the partnership will be an e-mail notification service on mobile phones for all Freeserve's customers from late January 2000.

The service forwards the first 140 characters of an e-mail to a mobile phone.

However, Freeserve is not the first in the market. The service is already available to Genie Internet customers.

Genie Internet is owned by BT Cellnet.

Related to this story:
Reuters news goes mobile (19 Jul 99 | The Company File)
Vodafone connects to Net (17 Sep 99 | Sci/Tech)
Near future is Orange (29 Sep 99 | Sci/Tech)

Internet Links: Freeserve BT Cellnet Genie Internet
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