Genie Internet Access

British Telecommunications PLC
16 November 2000

               GENIE BECOMES THE UK'S FIRST EXCLUSIVELY ONLINE

                                MOBILE SERVICE



-Genie offers unlimited mobile Internet access for £20 a month-

London, 16 November 2000 - Genie (www.genie.co.uk), Europe's leading mobile
Internet business, today launched the UK's first exclusively online mobile
service selling mobile phones offering unmetered mobile Internet access
through text messaging and WAP.

Customers who purchase online through Genie can initially choose from highly
competitive post-pay mobile tariffs. These tariffs offer unmetered WAP and/or
text messaging as part of the customer's monthly subscription; allow customers
to pay their bills online; keep track of calls made and costs; change their
tariffs online and have their queries answered online free of charge 24
hours-a-day, seven days-a-week. A pre-pay option will be available shortly. A
SIM-only offer, GPRS tariffs and handsets will be available in early 2001.

Kent Thexton, Managing Director of Genie said: 'Today Genie is throwing away
the rule book and revolutionising the way customers buy and manage their
mobiles. We're offering customers 'all you can eat' mobile Internet access for
just £20 a month. We're directly responding to the needs of the mobile
generation who rely on the Internet to manage their busy lives.

'Genie is able to offer the most competitive and compelling tariffs on the
market because we are cutting out the middleman and passing on cost savings
directly to our customers. Last month alone over 500 million text messages
were sent in the UK across all networks and our latest figures show that Genie
sees over 15 million WAP page impressions a month.'





'To win in the mobile Internet space you need to have scale, the best partners
and be first to market. Today's news represents another mobile Internet first
from Genie, and we don't intend to stop here because the stakes are high.  By
2003 more people will be connected to the Internet via mobile devices than
PCs. It is predicted that by 2005 the global mobile Internet market will be
worth $205bn, the worldwide opportunity for content and commerce providers
will be $25bn.'

Genie, together with BT Cellnet, has already made the Genie mobile e-shop
concept available through some of the UK's leading high street online bank
operations including NatWest, cahoot, Egg, Intelligent Finance (a division of
Halifax plc) and Lloyds TSB. The Genie shop will now be rolled out
internationally and become available from the Genie website and partner sites.

Genie is a Web and WAP portal and now an online mobile service. Genie already
has over 2 million registrations internationally and 1.4 million registrations
in the UK. This year Genie has gone live in The Netherlands, Italy, Hong Kong
and Malaysia.

The Genie shop and other Genie services will be rolled out in other European
countries and Asia Pacific. These will include Genie's unified messaging
service that will allow customers to truly integrate their messaging across
all fixed and mobile devices. This means that you will be able to read or
listen to your voicemails, faxes and e-mails over your fixed and mobile phone
or your pc through a single mailbox account.



                                     ENDS

Notes to Editors

*         From the Genie website customers can view the calls they have made
the previous day as well as their monthly bills online (this includes both
domestic and international calls made from the UK. Calls made from overseas
will take up to 30 days to be billed.) Customers are sent an email alert to
let them know their monthly statement is ready

*         Genie mobile customers will be connected through the BT Cellnet
network, which covers 99.5 percent of the UK population and has an
international reach of 264 networks in 118 countries.

*         The network ID (identification on handset screen) will say BT Genie



Tariff           Monthly         Peak Plan              Off-Peak Plan
                 Subcription
Basic Mobile     £10 includes    100 minutes free then  50 minutes free per day
Internet Service unlimited text  10p/ minute peak rate  then 20p/minute peak
(text messages)  messages        2p/minute off peak     rate 2p/minuteoff peak
Enhanced Mobile  £20 includes    100 minutes free then  50 minutes free per day
Internet Service unlimited text  10p/ minute peak rate  then 20p/minute peak
                 messages and    2p/minute off peak     rate 2p/minuteoff peak
                 WAP
High Speed       TBA early 2001
Mobile Internet
Access
Pre-Pay          December 2000


Handsets



Nokia 7110            -free on connection to a Genie tariff

Siemens C35           -free on connection to a Genie tariff

Nokia 3310            -free on connection to a Genie tariff

Nokia 6210            £99.99

Nokia 9110I           £199.99

Ericsson R3805        £249.99



About Genie



Genie is the global mobile Internet division of BT Openworld. It delivers the
best quality content via its web and WAP portals to fixed and mobile devices
around the world, with an objective to be the world's leading mobile Internet
portal.



Genie currently has web and WAP portals in the UK (where it is the mobile
Internet leader), Italy and the Netherlands and Hong Kong and Malaysia with
over 2 million registrations. Content on the portals includes breaking sports
results from Sports.com and 365 Corporation, the latest news from Guardian
Unlimited, business stories from 451.com, last minute travel deals from
lastminute.com and up-to-the-minute stock quotes from T D Waterhouse. Genie
has also partnered with world-leading portals including Yahoo! and Freeserve
to enable their customers to access their emails via Genie.



Genie's other businesses included Qdodge.com, a system for topping up pre-pay
mobile phones in real time via the web and ATM type machines.

Over the coming months, Genie is pursuing an aggressive international rollout
programme for both its web and WAP portals.

In November 2000, Genie launched the UK's first exclusively online mobile
operator selling mobile phones offering unmetered mobile Internet access
through text messaging and WAP.