Global Outsourcing Deal

Vodafone Group Plc
05 October 2006


5 October 2006

       VODAFONE SELECTS TWO PREFERRED SUPPLIERS IN GLOBAL OUTSOURCING DEAL

Vodafone has selected EDS and IBM to manage its application development and
maintenance services in a global IT outsourcing deal, as part of its strategic
commitment to reduce costs while leveraging its regional scale. Vodafone hopes
to conclude negotiations and finalise contracts with the two outsourcing
partners in the coming weeks.

Under the terms of the proposed arrangements, each outsourcing partner will
provide application development and maintenance services for key IT systems to
separate groupings of operating companies within the Vodafone Group. Vodafone
will retain full strategic control of the initiative, which focuses on writing
code for and maintaining systems such as billing and Customer Relationship
Management.

The proposed arrangements form part of Vodafone's cost reduction strategy.
Against this backdrop, Vodafone continues to stimulate revenue growth through
the roll out of new services and attractive tariffs which encourage customers to
use their mobile phones more extensively within the home and office.

Today's announcement is the result of a rigorous eight-month selection process,
which has reduced the number of candidates from 11 to two preferred outsourcing
partners, subject to final contract. Candidates were assessed against a wide
range of criteria including technical capability, outsourcing expertise, cost
and cultural fit to ensure the future success of the partnership.

As previously announced, Vodafone has identified the potential to reduce unit
costs by 25 to 30 percent within three to five years. Activity levels on
application development and maintenance during the last financial year resulted
in a spend of around £560 million. Under the plans, the number of application
development and maintenance suppliers currently used by the Group will be
rationalised by the two partners, bringing greater economies of scale. The Group
also anticipates that the initiative will result in improvements to the quality
of software produced, as well as greater flexibility, leading to the faster roll
out of more varied services to customers.

Under the proposals, the substantial majority of impacted staff are expected to
transfer to the employment of the outsourcing partners, and work from similar
locations under similar terms and conditions where possible. The remainder of
staff will be retained by Vodafone. The Group is currently in full consultation
with staff likely to be impacted by the changes.

Arun Sarin, Chief Executive of Vodafone, said: 'This initiative is a good
example of how Vodafone is finding new ways to deliver greater cost efficiencies
across the business. We are exploring the possibility of outsourcing other
non-core activities so that we can focus on our customers.

'The outsourcing of this application development and maintenance work
complements a series of other projects designed to reduce Group overheads
including the regional consolidation of data centres and the centralisation of
network supply chain management.'

                                     - ends-

For further information:

Vodafone Group
Investor Relations
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Media Relations
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CAUTIONARY STATEMENT

This press release contains 'forward-looking statements' with respect to
Vodafone's anticipated benefits, including anticipated cost savings, from the
global IT outsourcing deal described above. By their nature, they relate to
events and depend on circumstances that will occur in the future. There are a
number of factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from
those expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. These factors
include, but are not limited to the following: failure to conclude negotiations
and finalise contracts with one or both outsourcing partners; failure by the
outsourcing partners to perform as expected under the outsourcing arrangements;
changes in the scope of the work outsourced; slower than anticipated transfer of
certain activities to the partners; changes in the number of staff expected to
transfer to the outsourcing partners; changes in Vodafone's IT systems; higher
than anticipated costs to be incurred by Vodafone under the outsourcing
arrangements; and the impact of exchange rate fluctuations on the cost of the
services to the Group. Furthermore, a review of the reasons why actual results
and developments may differ materially from the expectations disclosed or
implied within forward-looking statements can be found under 'Risk Factors,
Trends and Outlook-Risk Factors' in the Group's Annual Report for the financial
year ended March 31, 2006. All subsequent written or oral forward-looking
statements attributable to Vodafone or any member of the Group or persons acting
on their behalf are expressly qualified in their entirety by the factors
referred to above. No assurances can be given that the forward-looking
statements in this document will be realised. Neither Vodafone nor any of its
affiliates intends to update these forward-looking statements.




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