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Momail to enter U.S. mobile email optimization market

Sweden is best known for Abba, IKEA, the Nobel Prize and Bjorn Borg. But Momail?

The Swedish mobile email optimizing company made its debut at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas with big predictions for the mobile email market.

"2008 is the year when mobile email will start lifting off," said Lars Aase, vice president of marketing for Momail, Stockholm.

"Operators will start to market the mobile email service," he said. "More and more operators will offer attractive fixed-price mobile data packages including services like free mobile email, and the mobile email products will be easier to start and to use."

Momail is a free mobile email service that optimizes emails before delivering them to a user's phone. Its in-house developed technology allows users to read email on any device with built-in email support.

The service optimizes images. For example, if a user emails a large picture file to a Momail mobile user, he or she will receive the file resized to fit the screen resolution of the mobile device.

Momail does not require special client software or downloads.

"The Momail mobile email service is free of charge and with the patented technology, all emails are optimized, saving up to 99 percent of the mobile data transferred to the mobile handset," Mr. Aase said.

Behind the Momail Web site is a databank of 2,300 phones with 450 features including graphics processing power, screen resolution, screen size, pixel depth and the phone's ability to open attachments. This data enables the optimization of content.

To use the service, consumers go to the Momail site at www.momail.se and enter a phone number, carrier and the make and model of their device. Momail then sends phone settings to the device, which automatically configures the email client in the handset.

Mr. Aase said that mobile email will be an interesting channel for mobile marketing, because "you can do much more -- and much cheaper than, for example, SMS -- using mobile email as content carrier."

Momail is currently operational with Swedish operator TeliaSonera and Norwegian carrier Telenor, the seventh-largest operator network in the world. It is also available on Halebop, a Swedish mobile virtual network operator.

The Momail service currently works on more than 1,000 different mobile phone models. It minimizes maintenance and support, enabling even small carriers to offer a mobile email service to the masses, Mr. Aase claims.

Beyond email, Momail is positioning itself as a carrier-independent gatekeeper of mobile content optimized for receiving handsets, which may include ringtones and other content in the future.

Momail is free of charge and works on all mobile phones with built-in email support. The service is currently available in Britain, Germany and in all Nordic countries, including Sweden. The company said that more countries will be added this year, beginning with Poland.

Momail is in beta for the U.S. market for a launch later this year.

"U.S. end-users are much better in using email in general," Mr. Aase said. "We believe Momail will get nice customer adoption when launched."