Joint Venture with HT Media Mobilises Indian Media

Joint venture with HT Media mobilises Indian media

VELTI, New Delhi and London – In its first strategic move into India, Velti Plc, a
leading provider of software platforms, applications and services for advertising
agencies, mobile operators and media, announces that it has established a new
mobile marketing joint venture with HT Media, India’s second largest media group.
The joint venture agreement was signed during the HT Leadership Summit in New
Delhi, at which Dr. Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister of India, was a speaker.

The Joint Venture (JV), in which Velti will have a 35 per cent shareholding, will
initially operate in New Delhi and Mumbai and will service large network operators,
brands and advertising agencies, as well as smaller regional companies, across India.
The JV will plan, execute and monitor media campaigns across all media channels,
including mobile, TV, online and print, using Velti’s technology. It will initially operate
from within Hindustan Times offices in New Delhi as well as having a sales team in
Mumbai.

HT Media is a listed media group owning one of India’s leading English publications,
Hindustan Times, as well as the vernacular daily - Hindustan and the business daily -
Mint. Together, the publications have a national readership base of more than 12
million readers.

The JV will look to benefit from the rapidly expanding population of mobile users in
India, enabling compelling campaigns, with mobile becoming a key element
alongside traditional media channels. There are now more than 300 million mobile
customers in the country and the market is continuing to grow quickly, with more
than 10 million mobile subscribers added in September 2008 alone [1]. Some
projections have the Indian market breaking the 500 million user mark by
September 2010[2].

HT Media has already established its digital presence through its radio station, Fever
104, and internet offerings, Hindustan Times.com, LiveMint.com, Shine.com and
DesiMartini.com, thereby providing relevant content to consumers as well as
innovative marketing solutions to brands across India. This JV marks HT Media’s
move into the mobile marketing space as a serious growth initiative. Significantly,
the new venture will be empowered to provide solutions even to other media,
advertising or marketing providers in India.

Rajiv Verma, CEO of HT Media Group, commented:

“HT Media is committed to the development of new media initiatives and, with Velti,
we look forward to offering breakthrough and patented mobile based marketing
services to our valued customers in India. It also reinforces our position as India’s
leading media house, providing a multi-channel advertising platform across print,
radio, internet and mobile.”

Alex Moukas, CEO of Velti, added:

“India is a key market for Velti and establishing the JV with HT Media represents a
significant strategic move in our global expansion. We are delighted to be in
partnership with such a prestigious media group and a company which recognises
the substantial opportunity the mobile channel represents. The mobile market in
India is growing very quickly and across the country mobile uptake continues to
outstrip internet connections, so it’s a very exciting time to start this new joint
venture”

-END-

For further information, please contact:

Nick Miles, PR Manager
nmiles@velti.com
+44 (0)207 633 5034

Note to editors
[1] Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), October 2008
[2] Informa Telecoms & Media, October 2008

About Velti
Velti’s market-leading mobile marketing technology platform, coupled with its
experience in the mobile advertising industry, enables clients around the world to
deliver an extensive range of highly targeted marketing campaigns. With operations
in 25 countries, and a mobile marketing joint venture with the Interpublic group, a
top global holding group of advertising agencies, Velti has the ability to reach
through its platform an estimated 1.4 billion consumers. Velti’s unique Mobile
Marketing and Advertising Platform manages the full cycle of planning, execution and
monitoring of multiple campaigns across differing mobile formats and channels,
offering customers more than 70 mobile marketing and advertising templates, which
can be managed from one user interface.

About HT Media
HT Media Limited is one of India’s foremost media companies, and home to two
leading newspapers in the country in English and Hindi languages - Hindustan Times
(English daily) and Hindustan (Hindi daily). Hindustan Times was started in 1924 and
it has an 80-year history as one of India’s leading newspapers. The Company also
has a business paper ‘Mint’ in Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chandigarh and Pune. The
Company’s subsidiary HT Music and Entertainment Company Limited has four FM
radio stations “Fever 104” in Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Kolkata. The Company
has also made a foray into the Internet space through its subsidiary Firefly e-
Ventures Limited and has acquired a social networking website DesiMartini.com and
also launched a new job portal Shine.com. These are in addition to the existing
websites livemint.com and hindustantimes.com. HT Media along with Bennett
Coleman & Co. Limited has entered into an equal partnership joint venture to publish
an English morning tabloid in Delhi & NCR titled Metro Now. In addition, the
Company has entered into a 51:49 joint venture (JV) with German media group
Hubert Burda to leverage HT Media's expertise in printing and publishing and capture
opportunities in the booming high-end magazine and catalogue printing space in
India and the Asia-Pacific region. HT Media also publishes two Hindi magazines
Nandan and Kadambini.