AZZURRI SHINES IN O2 CHANNEL

O2 today announced that it has invited Azzurri to join the O2 Data Centre of Excellence, an exclusive group of UK business partners working closely with O2 to grow the mobile data market. Azzurri becomes the first O2 partner to be a member of both O2 Advance and the O2 Data Centre of Excellence, a huge recognition of Azzurri’s success in the O2 Channel. Azzurri has been selected to join the O2 Data Centre of Excellence as it now meets the selection criteria in terms of data connections, ARPU and retention performance. Azzurri also manages a significant number of large corporate customers for O2. O2 launched the O2 Data Centre of Excellence in January 2007 to bring together leading experts in mobile data to best meet the needs of SME and corporate customers and to collaborate and grow the mobile data market. In joining the O2 Data Centre of Excellence, Azzurri will gain access to a range of benefits including marketing support, training and recruitment of high-calibre data specialists. The O2 Data Centre of Excellence is the first partner programme of its kind in the UK and is sponsored and supported by RIM and Nokia. Azzurri has been a member of O2 Advance, O2’s first partner programme, since its inception and is the strongest performing partner in the Southern region in terms of SME and data connections. It is also one of O2’s largest Direct Independent (DI) partners nationally. “Azzurri has proven itself as a very strong partner for O2 across the board, and in particular in data sales. Being selected for both O2 Advance and the O2 Centre of Excellence is an excellent endorsement of Azzurri’s ability to meet the needs of our business customers,” said Ben Dowd, General Manager, Business Sales, O2 UK. “We look forward to continuing to work with Azzurri to grow sales in this market.” “We are delighted to be the first independent to be appointed to both O2 Advance and the O2 Data Centre of Excellence,” said Simon Price, Sales Director, Mobile, Azzurri. “Having re-focused our sales team to be more data-centric, we are now witnessing the results with excellent penetration of data services to new customers, as well as our existing customer base.” The launch of the Centres of Excellence for Data and M2M in January 2007 followed the re-focus of O2’s UK business strategy to adopt a more IT-focused approach to corporate and SME sales. Each centre of excellence is specifically tailored to the area of business it covers, and aim to bring together experts in these areas to offer integrated end-to-end offerings to customers. Members of the centres of excellence benefit from: · O2 Endorsement and customer support · Marketing support · Recruitment (access to O2 recruitment agency for high calibre data sales professionals) · Training and accreditation · Dedicated O2 pre-sales data consultants · Trial/loan of devices · Access to events O2 Advance is O2’s support programme for Direct Independent partners in the UK. The programme offers a range of features including sales incentives and rewards, guaranteed market funding, bid management support, a dedicated sales support helpdesk and jointly branded sales tools to help DIs further develop and grow their businesses. -ends-