Under the agreement, Ericsson will provide a full swap of 1400 base stations, expanding the capacity of channel elements for voice and data to support speeds of up to 14.4Mbps. Ericsson will also provide a wide range of professional services, including business consulting, deployment and integration. Ericsson will support and maintain other Ericsson elements in Partner's network as well.

The deal reinforces Ericsson's leading position as the supplier of WCDMA/HSPA technology in Israel and is expected to lead to higher operational and technological efficiency and to result in cost reductions for Partner Communications. The system deployment has started and is set to be completed by July 2011.

Partner Communications' announcement yesterday:

Ericsson is shaping the future of Mobile and Broadband Internet communications through its continuous technology leadership. Providing innovative solutions in more than 140 countries, Ericsson is helping to create the most powerful communication companies in the world.

 

Ericsson Media Relations

Phone: +46 8 719 6992

E-mail: press.relations@ericsson.com

Partner Communications Company Ltd (Partner) is a leading Israeli mobile communications operator providing GSM/GPRS/UMTS/HSPA services and wireless applications under the orange brand. The Company provides quality service and a range of features to 2.796 million subscribers in Israel (as of September 30, 2007). Partner's ADSs are quoted on the NASDAQ Global Select Market and the London Stock Exchange. Its shares are also traded on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (NASDAQ and TASE: PTNR; LSE: PCCD). Partner is a subsidiary of Hutchison Telecommunications International Limited, a leading global provider of telecommunications services. Hutchison Telecom currently offers mobile and fixed-line telecommunications services in Hong Kong, and operates mobile telecommunications services in Israel, Macau, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Ghana, Vietnam and Indonesia. It was the first provider of 3G mobile services in Hong Kong and Israel and operates brands including Hutch, 3 and orange. Hutchison Telecom, a subsidiary of Hutchison Whampoa Limited, is a listed company with American Depositary Shares quoted on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker HTX and shares listed on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong under the stock code 2332. For more information about Hutchison Telecom, see www.htil.com

For more information about Partner, see www.orange.co.il/investor_site/

HSPA stands for High-Speed Packet Access. An inherent advantage of HSPA is that the technology is a natural extension of existing WCDMA/GSM networks, or about 85 percent of the world's existing wireless networks, and therefore has the potential to be readily available to a large number of wireless users, creating a mass market for mobile broadband.  By 2010, 71 percent of mobile broadband connections are projected to be HSPA based.

Ericsson's HSPA mobile broadband solution, part of Ericsson's Full Service Broadband offering, today enables download speeds of up to 14.4Mbps and upload speeds of 1.4Mbps. The advanced technology lets operators more than double their system capacity and cuts response times for interactive services. On average, users will be able to download 20 times faster than with a GSM/GPRS connection. Future evolution steps will increase the HSPA download speed to 42Mbps and the upload speed to 12Mbps. Ericsson offers HSPA support on many frequency bands ranging from 850MHz to 2.6GHz.