MELBOURNE, Australia-Australian operator Telstra Corp. said it launched i-mode services based on technology from Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo Inc.
The content service offers Telstra customers access to a wide range of Internet services such as shopping, entertainment, banking and e-mail, Telstra said. The service includes more than 165 content sites across 13 categories and is expected to increase to more than 200 sites in the next year.
Telstra’s i-mode sites include eBay, Citibank, CNN, Fox Sport, Whereis, Flight Centre and The Weather Channel. It is expected that i-mode sites will also soon feature advanced payment capabilities using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) security technology, allowing customers to make secure purchases directly from content provider sites with their credit cards.
NEC and Panasonic i-mode handsets are available now from 28 selected Telstra stores around Australia. Additional handset models will be available in February when the service is promoted more broadly to the consumer market.
“Telstra is striving to deliver innovative mobile services and products that enhance the lives of our customers, and i-mode demonstrates a fresh approach to marketing mobile data services. If we do this correctly with a strong emphasis on customer education, we will be ideally positioned for the introduction of 3G in 2005,” said David Moffatt, Telstra’s group managing director, consumer and marketing.
DoCoMo announced earlier this week that Israel’s CellCom also plans to offer i-mode service. The offering has now been rolled out in nine countries and has more than 45 million subscribers worldwide.<p
