Vodafone Portugal Launches Comverse Visual Voicemail Service on Mobile Phones

WAKEFIELD, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Comverse announced today that Vodafone Portugal, which has more than five million mobile phone users, became the country’s first operator to offer visual voicemail for the iPhone.

“Visual voicemail delivers so many benefits for both users and operators”

Vodafone Portugal began offering Comverse Visual Voicemail on the iPhone in March. Compared to conventional voicemail, the service allows customers to enjoy a dramatically enhanced voicemail experience. Instead of dialing in for voice messages, users can see information about each voice message, such as sender, time of call and duration, in a message inbox on their mobile phones and then click and listen to messages in any order. Users also can delete, forward and reply to any message.

“This groundbreaking visual voicemail launch is part of Vodafone Portugal’s strategy of continuous innovation intended to develop and make available the best communications services to our customers,” said Pedro Duarte, Network Services Development Manager at Vodafone Portugal. “We believe it will play an important role in enhancing our customers’ experience with the iPhone 3G, supported by the high quality, capacity and speed of the Vodafone network.”

Users of visual voicemail can access voice messages more quickly and return calls more often because timely messages are inherently more relevant. For these reasons, callers are more likely to leave voice messages. This boost in voicemail usage also benefits operators by enhancing the end user’s satisfaction and loyalty.

“This deployment with Vodafone Portugal is a significant step forward for visual voicemail in its progress towards becoming the next-generation voicemail standard around the world – a trend led by Comverse, which has more visual voicemail deployments than any other company,” said Dror Bin, President, Global Products and Operations at Comverse, the world's leading supplier of software and systems enabling value-added messaging and content services, converged billing and active customer management, and IP communications.

“Visual voicemail delivers so many benefits for both users and operators,” Bin said, “that its potential for rapid market growth in the near future is strong in all regions.”

Visual Voicemail is part of the Comverse Voice HUB, a single platform for multiple voice-related services, such as next-generation voicemail, ringback tones, and call completion. Operators can reap cost savings from the Voice HUB’s unified platform because it reuses major components and takes advantage of centralized operation, maintenance and provisioning.

About Vodafone Portugal

Vodafone Portugal is part of the Vodafone Group, the world’s leading international mobile communications group. Vodafone Portugal focuses on delivering total communications solutions to its more than 5.7 million customers and has a leadership position in terms of innovation, brand image and customer satisfaction in Portugal. More information about Vodafone Portugal is available at its Web site.

About Comverse

Comverse is the world’s leading provider of software and systems enabling value-added services for voice, messaging, mobile Internet and mobile advertising; converged billing and active customer management; and IP communications. Comverse’s extensive customer base spans more than 130 countries and covers over 500 communication service providers serving more than two billion subscribers. The company’s innovative product portfolio enables communication service providers to unleash the value of the network for their customers by making their networks smarter. Comverse’s solutions support flexible deployment models, including in-network, hosted and managed services, and can run on circuit-switched, IP, IMS or converged network environments. Comverse is a subsidiary of Comverse Technology, Inc. (CMVT.PK). For more information, visit www.comverse.com.

All product and company names mentioned herein may be registered trademarks or trademarks of Comverse or the respective referenced company(s).

This release contains “forward-looking statements” under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 that involve risks and uncertainties. There can be no assurances that any forward-looking statements will be achieved. Important factors that could affect the statements contained herein include: changes in the demand for the company’s products; changes in capital spending among the company’s current and prospective customers; the risks associated with the sale of large, complex, high capacity systems and with new product introductions as well as the uncertainty of customer acceptance of these new or enhanced products from either the company or its competition; and risks associated with rapidly changing technology and the ability of the company to introduce new products on a timely and cost-effective basis. The company undertakes no commitment to update or revise forward-looking statements except as required by law.

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