PC-to-phone instant messaging to go live

30-06-2005

by Charlie Taylor

MSN and Vodafone have announced plans to launch a consumer-focused instant messaging (IM) service between PCs and mobile phones.

The new enhanced messaging service, which is due to go live in a number of European countries before the end of the year, is set to bring together more than 165 million MSN Messenger users and almost 155 million Vodafone customers, the pair said.

Using the new service, customers will be able to see the presence of their contacts and exchange instant messages between MSN Messenger on a PC and Vodafone Messenger on a mobile phone.

"MSN and Vodafone are working to enhance messaging between mobile phones and PCs, ultimately delivering a richer experience to customers," said Blake Irving, corporate vice president of the MSN Communication Services and Member Platform group at Microsoft.

"By enabling our customers to see each other's presence on both PC and mobile devices, we are expanding our customers' ability to make smart communication choices and connect instantly via IM to the people they care about most."

Vodafone has said it is to make the service available to both prepay and postpay customers. MSN Messenger users meanwhile will be able to pay online. Although neither company has indicated how much it plans to charge to send messages, it is expected that users will be able to buy bundles of messages that will work out as cheaper than SMS text messages.

"We have brought together two of the world's largest messaging communities with a first of its kind for both industries -- a seamless PC-to-mobile instant messaging service. Vodafone customers will now be able to use IM and its additional service benefits to stay in touch with mobile and PC friends and family," said Peter Bamford, chief marketing officer for Vodafone.

"IM is a growing part of the increasingly important mobile messaging market. By bringing our collective customers together, we'll deliver more options for staying in touch when messaging. Our agreement will grow IM and SMS, meaning additional revenue for Vodafone."

The new service is being launched initially in Italy, Spain and the Netherlands. According to a local spokesperson for Vodafone, no date has been given for the launch in Ireland. However the service definitely won't be available to Irish customers this year as Vodafone is busy concentrating on launching a number of 3G propositions.