Press News

Budapest, May 17, 2006

T-Online Hungary announced at a press conference held on World Internet Day that it wants to remain the – internet-driven – engine of fast and continuous growth in the telecommunications market: in the field of web content services and the development and expansion of access services alike. With the acquisitions implemented in the recent period the company wants to promote the interests of residential and business users, and partners and exploit the opportunities offered by the internet.

The members of the iWiW community portal grew by 77 000 after its recent acquisition by T-Online Hungary, and approached 740 000 registered users; with this result iWiW could occupy the third rung of an imaginary ladder in terms of daily individual number of visits to audited websites. With the acquisition of Adnetwork the company wants to create better positions for the small but ambitious content providers: the portfolio and online services offered by T-Online serve as a good springboard for these companies. The existing portfolio will also be strengthened both on the access and the content sides. 80% of the company’s customers are already using broadband for their internet browsing, they will also be able to watch the summer football championship recaps on the [origo] portal via fast and secure connection.

As far as the online advertising market is concerned, in the first quarter of 2006 the revenue of the eight sites listed by the Hungarian Online Advertising Index (MOHI) (Habostorta, HáziPatika, Index.hu, Napi Online, Portfolio.hu, Ringier Online, Sanoma Online, T-Online [origo] portfolio) was 939 411 000 HUF, which is more than 70 per cent growth over the 550 200 000 of the corresponding period of last year.


Expanding portfolio

At the end of April T-Online Hungary Ltd. signed an agreement on the purchase of iWiW Kft. that operates the biggest Hungarian community portal. The former slow and interrupted downloads experienced earlier by the users have now been eliminated. Thanks to the developments and improvements to the community site that maps existing friendships and relations, the system has stabilized. The servers are being continuously replaced, which revives the “shortest route” function, a modern proof of the theory that people – wherever they live in the country – can be connected with one another in five steps. The messaging function has also been stabilized and the pictures have been moved to a larger storage room, as a result of which the picture service will also be faster. T-Online Hungary is backing up the service with even more machines so as to have reserve capacity, which also means that the distribution of invitations may also start soon.

It can be seen that since the acquisition the number of users is growing continuously: since the change of owners the online community has expanded by 77 000 members, reaching almost 740 000 registered users by the middle of May. This also means that 20-40 times more people register daily than quit the system.

According to Webaudit, the iWiW site has four hundred thousand visitors daily, which makes it the fourth most visited Hungarian site. In the past two weeks it could occupy the third rung of an imaginary ladder in terms of the number of daily individual visits to audited websites. In terms of page impressions it is the second most visited website, which is all the more extraordinary as iWiW – unlike the majority of the portals – is not public for everyone. Progress has been made also in respect of the data security concerns voiced at the time of the acquisition, the data security audit of iWiW is in progress and the company’s representatives are continuously comparing notes with the office of the date security commissioner.

For T-Online Hungary this spring was a season of acquisitions. In early May the company purchased the biggest Hungarian online advertising network Adnetwork Kft, with which it wants to raise the small content providers into the limelight. Its declared intention is to promote their growth, give space for their sites and serve their development. With the company’s help a stable background and a professional environment can be ensured for these firms. Research suggests that the bulk of the online advertising market revenues are generated on the five largest internet sites. However, besides these there exist thousands of other sites with valuable content and large numbers of visitors that are not visible to the prospective advertisers and are consequently beyond reach.


New technology – the first Hungarian IPTV takes off

T-Online Hungary announced earlier this spring that it will soon start the technical tests of the IP-based television service. Compared to traditional television, IPTV promises a brand new experience because, in addition to the customary television programs, the viewers will also have the opportunity to try new content services like the digital video store, the program recorder, the electronic program listings, the pause function, the child lock and other interactive options.

The tests are making good progress; in the next step T-Online will involve more users in the tests and intends to make the new technology available in other areas, too, by July. Network coverage will be expanded in each new phase, so by the second half of the year the majority of Budapest and five cities will be “webbed”. The commercial launch can also be expected first in these areas. In the current test period the programs of 35 television channels and 4 movie channels can be reached via IPTV and users also have a choice of 250 films including 188 features, 20 cartoons, 14 Hungarian films and 35 adult films.


Online media market review

In the first quarter of 2006 the revenue of the eight sites listed by the Hungarian Online Advertising Index (MOHI) (Habostorta, HáziPatika, Index.hu, Napi Online, Portfolio.hu, Ringier Online, Sanoma Online, T-Online [origo] portfolio) was 939 411 000 HUF, which is more than 70 per cent growth over the 550 200 000 HUF of the corresponding period of last year. The revenues of the [origo] portfolio grew faster than the MOHI in the first three months of 2006.

The largest ever growth of the purely online advertising revenues – that is revenues not containing barter revenues and other non-advertising revenues and agents’ commissions – in the first three months is to be thanked to the fact, some observers suggest, that the political parties also made ample use of the web surfaces in the election campaign. MOHI is the only index based on genuine revenues of the online advertising market. In 2005 the MOHI measured 40 per cent growth over 2004.


One million individual visitors daily in the [origo] portfolio and football world championship recaps on the [origo] and t-online.hu portals

According to the measurings of Median Webaudit the number of daily individual visits to the sites of the [origo] portfolio (including [origo], [freemail], t-online.hu and G-portal) exceeded one million on five occasions in the past weeks. The reach peaks of fundamental importance in the media world were recorded on the first working day of the week in most of the cases, the most recent peak was on May 15 when the number of individual visits exceeded the one million threshold.

In an effort to reach new peaks T-Online Hungary and the owners of the broadcasting rights of the 2006 FIFA Football World Championship, Infront WM Ag (Switzerland) have recently signed a license agreement for the internet rights of the world championship summaries. Under this agreement T-Online Hungary may present the following contents on the [origo] and t-online.hu portals in the context of the World Championship starting on June 9: recaps of the WC matches, daily summaries, group summaries, the best team and the best player, the finest goals and the best scorer.

With this step T-Online guarantees that no one will miss the goals of their favorite team: the summaries of all the matches will be continuously available on the [origo] and t-online.hu pages. The four-minute Hungarian-language summaries will be available for everyone free of charge on demand (subsequently, and at any time) within two hours of the given match. The license agreement will stay in force till the end of September.