Ericsson and Napster made Napster Mobile available to mobile network operators in Europe, North America and Asia. In Europe, Ericsson will manage an Austrian entertainment portal and will deliver mobile music to a Polish operator ONE selected Ericsson to host and manage its entertainment portal.

Napster Mobile was formally debuted to mobile operators at 3GSM in Barcelona and is the result of a global partnership forged by the companies in June of last year. This new service allows consumers to purchase artist images, ring tones and full-length songs via WAP or using an integrated software application on their mobile handsets.

Ericsson offers Napster Mobile as a hosted service, a business model that makes it easy, fast, and cost-efficient for operators to launch the service.

Using Napster Mobile, consumers can search and browse Napster’s enormous music catalog, preview, purchase and play songs on their mobile handsets through an integrated music player. Napster Mobile is also the first mobile music service to offer fully-integrated dual-delivery of music, meaning when consumers use their handsets to request content, a downloadable copy is sent directly to the phone and an additional copy is simultaneously sent to their PCs, enabling them to manage all of their content in one location. Using Napster’s PC software, consumers can listen to their purchased music, create play lists, rip and burn CDs and even transfer songs to other portable devices. Napster Mobile is based on SDP Media, Ericsson’s service delivery platform tailored for media solutions, and works on handsets from all major manufacturers.

Hans Vestberg, Executive Vice President Global Services Ericsson, says: “Operators gain access to one of the biggest digital music brands in the world through Napster Mobile. We feel confident that the service will allow mobile operators to seize opportunities for digital music on the mobile phone and PC that they might not have had access to before.”

SunCom Wireless, a wireless phone service provider in the Southeast United States, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, has agreed to offer the Napster Mobile music service to all of its subscribers. SunCom is the first U.S. wireless carrier to agree to offer Napster Mobile, Ericsson’s new, hosted music service featuring Napster’s massive catalog of artist images, ring tones and full-length songs.

Napster Mobile’s integrated software application will allow SunCom Wireless customers to search and browse the content in Napster’s catalog and listen to 30-second previews of any song in the service, as well as play all the music they purchase. Napster Mobile features a recommendation engine, which makes content recommendations based upon each consumer’s personal musical taste.

The Napster Mobile service is scheduled to go live on the SunCom Wireless Network during the first half of this year.

In Europe, Ericsson has been selected by Austrian operator ONE to host and manage the entire “Ladezone” entertainment portal. Ericsson will supply www.ladezone.at with its white label personalized music service, entertainment download service and ringback tone service.

The service will provide all Austrian mobile network users with easy access to today’s most attractive content, be it full length tracks, true tones (ring tones playing the original music), polyphonic ring tones, video clips, logos, games, or ringback tones. Ericsson’s white label music and download service comes with an advanced personalization engine that recommends artists, tracks and other content tailored to each consumer’s individual taste, allowing customers to easily find the content that is right for them.

“The easy-to-use services under this agreement will help ONE attract subscribers with complete entertainment packages. The Music offering is especially attractive, and with it being one of ONE’s cornerstones today we are convinced it will contribute to their success in this area,” said Jan Campbell, Head of Market Unit Central Europe, Ericsson.

Polkomtel SA, operator of the Polish Plus GSM mobile network, have chosen Ericsson to deliver mobile music. MegaMuza, the music service of Polkomtel SA, aims to deliver music from all major record labels as well as from numerous independent labels to 9 million Plus GSM subscribers. The variety of content is a distinctive feature of the service: mono- and polyphonic ringtones, real tones, mobile handsets graphics and artist news. Music videos and a huge selection of full-length tracks from major labels will be added this year.

“Development of mobile terminals is not only connected with new mobile services (e.g. MMS, PTT), but also with expanding their functionalities to camera and music player” said Miroslaw Bielicki, Polkomtel SA Board of Directors Vice-president. “Due to larger availability of such telephones we look forward with optimism to mobile music sales potential. The cooperation with Ericsson on MegaMuza ensures accomplishing our goals.”