Mobile Egypt | Your gateway for mobile technology

71 Million mobile phone subscribers in Egypt

The number of mobile phone subscribers in Egypt reached 71.46 million at a monthlyآ changeآ rate of 1.13%, and آ an annualآ آ change rateآ of 27.95%, while the mobile penetration rate 91.32% with monthlyآ change rate of آ 0.88%, and annual change rate of 18.66%, according to the indicators issued by the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology until last January.

All-in-one business smartphone, the Nokia E7, arrives in stores

Nokia shares its latest strategy and future plans and shows commitment to Egyptian Market and consumers

Today, during a press conference which took place at the Four Seasons, Mathia Nalappan, Nokia General Manager in North Africa, along with Brad Brockhaug, Nokia Head of Sales of Africa shared with Egyptian media Nokia latest new strategy and future plan. The general manager of the Finnish brand stated â€œNokia continues to be committed to the Egyptian market and to maintain leadership. We are still keen on having local knowledge and talent in our Egypt officeâ€‌, Nalappan added. We also will continue to hire directly and indirectly many local talents in our employees, field forces, agencies, distributors, care partners, etc.â€‌

On this occasion Mr. Nalappan also announced that Nokia started the shipping of the latest brand new E7 device this month. The highly anticipated Nokia E7 is available today in Egypt stores.

With its tilting 4 inch ClearBlack display, full QWERTY keyboard and a fast access to a wide variety of apps directly on the homescreen, the Nokia E7 is the key to having a successful day in or out of the office. Importantly, the device supports business applications from leading enterprise technology partners including Microsoft and IBM. Of course, thereâ€™s also all the other features that youâ€™ve come to expect from a new Symbian device, with access to Ovi Store for great apps and free drive and walk navigation across 80 countries with Ovi Maps.

â€œPeople are continuing to look for solutions that suit both their work and personal life; in business circles this is known as the â€کconsumerizationâ€™ of IT. The Nokia E7 gives people the confidence to bring their own smartphones to the workplace to connect securely to corporate messaging servers,â€‌ said Mathia Nalappan, General Manager for Nokia North Africa. â€œOn the other hand, whether you are an artist, entrepreneur, university student or aspiring world traveller, the Nokia E7 is the only smartphone you will need to get the worldâ€™s best mobile navigation and mapping application, thousands of apps, millions of music, and a rich messaging experience.â€‌

For business users, Nokia E7 provides direct, secure and real-time access to email, calendar, contacts, tasks and the corporate directory through Microsoft Exchange servers, as well as Office Communicator Mobile, developed by Microsoft for Nokia smartphones, which brings presence and corporate instant messaging.

Additionally, a wide range of entertainment and social services available on the Nokia E7 make it the perfect off-duty companion, and the Ovi Store offers a wealth of Global apps such as Bloomberg, Angry Birds; Gravity and Sports Tracker as well as few other local ones, likeآ Wasalny, Otlob, Masrawy, Stock Tracker for local stock exchange.

The new arrival offers drive or walk navigation in 80 countries. The latest commercial version of Ovi Maps, available immediately via Ovi Store or Ovi Suite, adds visibility to subways, trams and trains, real-time traffic, safety alerts, visibility to parking and petrol stations, speed limit warnings, and improved search and location sharing capabilities.

Here are more reasons why the Nokia E7 is the all-in-one business smartphone:

Easy access to private and business email
Create, edit and share office documents and view PDF files with Adobe Reader
Fast, secure intranet access with the built-in VPN
High-resolution photos and HD video with the 8 megapixel camera and dual LED flash
HDMI connectivity to project files, videos and images onto large screens
16 gigabytes of on-board flash memory
USB-On-The-Go, enabling easy file sharing by connecting a USB stick to the smartphone

E7 in details:

The Nokia E7 comes with an 8-megapixel full-focus camera with dual-LED flash. The camera can also shoot HD Video. Thereâ€™s also an HDMI adapter so you can use the device to show off your photos and videos, not to mention business presentations, on large displays and using projectors. Thereâ€™s 16GB of on-board flash memory. If that isnâ€™t enough, or you need to share files, you can use the USB-On-The-Go feature to attach USB memory sticks. The same technique can also be used for accessories such as the recently released digital radioآ andآ DVB-TVآ adapters. The Nokia E7 provides secure access to email, calendar, contacts and tasks through Microsoft Exchange server. You also get Microsoft Communicator Mobile, for secure corporate instant messaging. For smaller businesses and individuals, naturally it supports other POP/IMAP services like Gmail, Hotmail and thousands of other domain names. For the technically inclined, the device measures 123.7 x 62.4 x 13.6mm and weighs 176g. The battery is rated for up to five hours talk-time over WCDMA (more over GSM) and 430 hours standby. It offers pentaband communications for international travellers, 3G data rates up to 10.2 Mbps over HSDPA and 802.11 b/g/n WiFi. The device is available in the same colours as the Nokia N8: dark grey, silver-white, blue, green and orange.

About Nokia

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 1.3 billion people connect to one another with a Nokia device â€“ 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.

Media Enquiries:

Nokia
Communications
Dana ADNANI, Communications Manager

Dana.adnani@nokia.com

www.nokia.com

Intel makes another big mobile acquisition: Egypt’s SySDSoft

Monday, chipmaker Intel Corp. announced that its recently formed Intel Mobile Communications group has acquired “most of the assets” of privately held Egyptian communications company SySDSoft, a company whose intellectual property includes LTE Protocol Stacks for user equipment and femtocell premises equipment.
In August 2010, Intel acquired Infineon AG’s wireless group for an estimated $1.4 Billion, giving the chipmaker access to a significant chunk of the global cellular baseband market. Then five months later, Intel announced the creation of its new Mobile Communications Group which would see the company working not only with its traditional x86 processor architecture, but also with the popular 32-bit ARM architecture.
Today’s acquisition of SySDSoft’s assets brings the new Intel unit approximately 100 of the Egyptian company’s electrical engineers and computer scientists, and the solutions in the software stack and physical layer domain, and RF/analog circuits embedded in mobile platforms.
Last October, SySDSoft announced it had completed its LTE user equipment protocol stack performance tests and managed to achieve a simultaneous throughput of 300Mbps downlink/75Mbps uplink.

Egyptâ€™s Orascom looks to invest in local sites

Egyptâ€™s leading telecommunications company Orascom Telecom (OT) said in a press statement on Wednesday that it is looking to increase its investment in local enterprises, including content providers.
Local Egyptian financial newspaper al-Mal reported that its new affiliate Orascom Telecommunications is eyeing a number of Internet websites on the local market in the hopes of acquiring and investing in their potential.
The new entity said it would concentrate much of the investment on broadband and Internet services in Egypt, Naguib Sawiris was reported to have said by the newspaper.
He added that the firm had set aside 500 million Egyptian pounds (US$83.6 million) for acquisitions and could increase this if other opportunities arise.
Khaled Bechara, OTâ€™s CEO, said that they are looking into service portals such as Masrawy and hope to provide boosted broadband and VAT services outside Egypt.

MobiNil reports 8% increase in revenues

As a result of the strong subscriber growth, Egyptian cellco MobiNil witnessed 8% year-on-year increase in its revenues with EGP10.8 billion (USD1.9 billion) for 2009. 9% increase in the EBITDA has also been reported going up to EGP5.1 billion while net income came in at EGP2 billion, up 3%. The subscriber base of the company stood at 24.1 million at December 31, up from 19.2 million twelve months previously. Due to the staunch competition between MobiNil and rival cellcos Vodafone Egypt and Etisalat Misr (Nile Telecom), the average monthly ARPU across the year fell from EGP46 in 2008 to EGP39 in 2009.