[IMG=1]
Friday 22nd April: PlayFon, Russia's leading provider of wireless entertainment, today announced that it has signed a deal with I-play, the mobile games company, to exclusively distribute its games in Russia. At the beginning of the month, the mobile games company changed its identity from Digital Bridges to I-play, and launched its mission to make mobile gaming the world's most popular form of electronic gaming.
PlayFon's new distribution partnership with I-play means that it has the exclusive distribution rights to PC hits, such as 'EA Sports FIFA Football 2005' and 'Colin McRae Rally 2005', as well as branded action titles such as 'Pink Panther', 'Robocop' and 'The Fast and The Furious' are now available for Russian cell-phone users. PlayFon's portfolio will now include more than 20 games from I-play.
"The partnership with I-play is very important to us. We have always tried to bring our customers the best content and the games from I-play are of the highest-possible quality," the head of Mobile Games department Andrei Minakov noted.
The Russian market research group, SmartMarketing predicts a market growth of 170% for mobile games sold in Russia in 2005. Last year, the Russian mobile games market amounted to 5.3 million units sold, which equates to $12.3 million in revenues. Russian handset manufacturers are forecasting that by 2006 Russia will be the largest mobile communication market in Europe with somewhere in the region of 100 million mobile phone users.
"Russia is currently the fastest growing mobile market in Europe. In 2004 the number of mobile phone users in Russia grew by 70% to 60 million mobile customers, after a doubling in 2003 from 16 million to 32 million users, which clearly makes this market an exciting place to be. We are pleased to be working with a distributor like PlayFon, that has such a strong position in this buoyant market," Brian Greasley, CEO of I-play said.
"Signing the exclusive contract with I-play not only means high evaluation of our efforts, but also indicates the growing interest of the key Western players to the Russian market. Low purchasing power of Russian consumers, piracy, and stagnant demand for high-quality products that had hampered mutually beneficial cooperation between Russian content providers and leading developers, passed in history. Currently, we are working with all the best Java-game providers. Building strong partnership with developers is the top priority for the company. Thus we hope to solidify our leading position on home turf and to integrate into the world market of mobile content," PlayFon vice-president Vladimir Borodin said.

****
About PlayFon

PlayFon�, the provider of wireless entertainment, offers a wide range of services in Russia and UK. PlayFon� is listed among Top10 Russian content-providers (according to J'son and Partners). Playfon� is a part of LCS Group, which is ranked 62nd in top 100 Russian IT-companies (CNews100) and second in the list of fast-growing companies in the Russian IT-market (CNewsFAST).



About I-play

I-play, the mobile games company, brings the best in mobile entertainment to a mobile gaming audience of half a billion people via mobile operators, retail stores and online portals, including www.iplay.com. I-play has been creating mobile games since 1998 and continues to spearhead the creation of games for the next generation. As one of the world's longest established and respected creators of mobile games, the I-play brand stands for quality and the best in mobile game development. Working with the best media and entertainment brands, I-play is 100% focused on mobile games, and dedicated to fulfilling the promise of the mobile phone as the first truly mass-market electronic games platform.

I-play's investors are Apax Partners and Argo Global Capital. I-play is headquartered in London, with European Regional HQ in Dunfermline, Scotland and North American Regional HQ in San Mateo, California as well as sales offices in Paris, Munich, Madrid, Rome, New York, Fairfax, Sao Paulo and Singapore.