MIH India Invests $12.3 Million into ACL Wireless

New Delhi, Delhi, India, Tuesday, July 10, 2007 -- (Business Wire India)

MIH India (ibibo.com), part of the multi-million dollar media conglomerate, Naspers, today announced a strategic investment into mobile value added services company ACL Wireless. MIH India has picked up 30 percent stake in mobile value added services company ACL Wireless.

The total value of the Investment from MIH’s end is $12.3 Million for a strategic stake of 30 per cent in ACL Wireless Ltd.

Commenting on this strategic investment Ashish Kashyap, CEO, MIH India (ibibo.com) emphasized, “Our investment in ACL Wireless is part of our India growth strategy. ACL Wireless has built strong products and services in the mobile VAS space and has strong partnerships and alliances with mobile operators across the globe (Besides India). This strategic investment will enable MIH owned ibibo.com to make in-roads into the growing Indian Mobile Value Added Services market.”

Sanjay Goyal, CEO, ACL Wireless further added, “The partnership will also drive joint efforts for development of consumer based products and services for the mobile. The strategic investment and partnership will also give ACL Wireless an opportunity to access MIH’s global foot print”.

The investment comes at a time when the mobile VAS sector in India, currently at approx. US $ 500 million is expected to grow to US $ 10 billion by 2010.

MIH in India, earlier this year soft launched ibibo.com, a growing social community web site with a suite of applications. Naspers has interests in Media and Internet businesses in South Africa, China, Brazil, Russia, Thailand and India.

ACL Wireless owns Frenzo, a mobile based social networking platform and develops solutions in the field of mobile communities, instant messaging, carrier agnostic connectivity and content aggregation.

About ibibo.com

Log on to ibibo.com and you will find a line screaming ibibo.com “I Build; I Bond” – This defines the core proposition which is a strong paradigm of the next wave of Internet and a shift of power in the hands of the community!

The core consumer proposition is woven around the aspect of empowering Indians to create, build, share and connect with each other!

ibibo.com’s goal as a key stake holder in the web 2.0 space in India is to garner a community that generates and shares knowledge and at the same time enabling users to extract this local knowledge and wisdom.

ACL Wireless limited

ACL Wireless Limited is a leading India-based provider of mobile value added services to operators, enterprises and consumers. ACL Wireless owns a mobile social networking property called Frenzo and it develops solutions in the field of mobile communities, instant messaging, carrier agnostic connectivity and content aggregation. ACL’s unique solutions have benefited more than 25 mobile operators in several emerging markets across the globe as well as over 100 tier-I enterprises, media companies and content providers in India.

ACL was declared a Red Herring 100 Asia winner for 2006 and has also been ranked amongst India's fastest growing technology companies by Deloitte, two years in a row. Founded in 2000, the company employs over 220 people and operates from its offices in Noida, New Delhi, Mumbai and Dubai.

Further Information:

On the build side MIH India soft launched ibibo.com (In Jan 07). ibibo.com is a social media sharing product that operates a bouquet of web 2.0 based products such as Answers, Blogging, Networking, Photo Sharing and Search. The brand stands for the value: “I Build, I Bond”: Empowering the user to Create, Build, Express, share and find. In a short span of time ibibo, is gaining popularity, visibility and high levels of user interaction.

On the acquire piece – MIH acquired Bixee.com, A vertical job search engine in 2006 with robust technology and a strong management team.

On the Invest piece – MIH’s recent investment into ACL Wireless is clearly a further step into the organization achieving its chartered goals.

Going forward MIH will continue to focus on augmenting ibibo.com and building new products and innovations. Besides this MIH and ibibo.com will continue to explore new investment opportunities with both early stage internet start ups and even with growing companies.

About Naspers (MIH Global Operations)

Naspers is a multinational media company with principal operations in electronic media (including pay-television, internet and instant-messaging subscriber platforms and the provision of related technologies) and print media (including the publishing, distribution and printing of magazines, newspapers and books, and the provision of private education services). Naspers’ most significant operations are located in South Africa, where it generates approximately 76.4% of its revenues, with other operations located elsewhere in Sub-Saharan Africa, Greece, Cyprus, the Netherlands, the United States, Thailand and China. Naspers creates media content, builds brand names around it, and manages the platforms distributing the content. Naspers delivers its content in a variety of forms and through a variety of channels, including television platforms, internet services, newspapers, magazines and books. Many of Naspers’ businesses hold leading market positions, and Naspers capitalises on these strong positions when expanding into new markets.