Middle East & North Africa Telecommunications

SINGAPORE–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Mobinil, Egypt’s largest mobile operator, has selected Followap, the leader in mobile IM, presence and interconnect solutions to power its own brand instant messaging service. Subscribers to Mobinil’s operator IM service will be able to enjoy the benefits of real time communications on their mobile device through Followap’s IMSC (Instant Messaging Service Centre).

Market trends indicate that operator branded IM is quickly becoming one of the most important real-time communication services across the globe, and is an important GSMA initiative. Mobinil’s Messaging service answers the needs of SMS users by providing them with an advanced real-time communications service which provides valuable “presence” or availability information of subscribers also signed up to the service.

“Mobinil’s plans to rollout mobile instant messaging is another example of the growing momentum behind this exciting communications service,” said Alex Sinclair, the CTO of the GSMA, the global trade association for mobile phone operators. “The GSMA is working with the industry to ensure their technology is fully interoperable so that users can exchange messages across networks - a factor that has been instrumental in the enormous success of text messaging.”

“Mobinil is committed to enable mobile subscribers in Egypt to communicate in a dynamic and friendly manner, and IM is an intuitive and efficient service which will meet our customers needs,” said Hervé Suquet VP and COO at Mobinil. “We selected Followap’s IMSC and IM Clients to provide the best service to our customers, and we expect IM to become a core part of our service offering,” concluded Suquet.

“Creating operator-branded IM services leverages the large operator SMS community to form a naturally evolved IM community. The iFollow IMSC enables operators to take control of their IM services, build the brand, increase revenues and create a differentiated and value-added service,” said Simon Brown, VP Global Sales and Customer Operations at Followap. “We are very pleased to be working with Mobinil. Their subscribers will be able to see the availability of their contacts, if they are busy, driving, in a meeting, or available just by looking at their address book. All the information they need will be in one single view, so they can decide the best way to communicate,” concluded Brown.