Europe : Last week's Music Week Awards saw 3 take the title of best Digital Music Service for the second year running. 3’s continuing commitment to providing the highest quality, best value content to its users saw it take the top spot ahead of tough competition including AOL Music and Napster.

Inset shows Mark Joseph, Director of Television and Music, 3 UK and he commented “The Music Week awards are some of the most credible in the Industry and for 3’s music service to be recognised was a real validation of our position in the market place. 3 now represent 10.5% of the total UK singles market and stand second only to iTunes in UK digital music sales - The Music Week award showed how the market is changing and really highlighted the potential of music on your mobile.”

The past year has seen 3’s music service expand to take 75% of the mobile music download market, and a 10.5% share of the overall UK singles market. With 500,000 customers regularly downloading music, 3 provides over 1 million downloads a month, reaching 1.5 million in December 2006. This makes 3 second only to iTunes in the UK digital download market.

 3’s growth has been boosted by a host of new content ranging from high profile exclusive releases to unique live performance videos and a brand new unsigned band initiative.  Highlights of 2006 included.

- Launch of 3’s Music Store – 3MusicStore is 3’s digital music shop. Users can browse and search over 500,000 tracks and download them in as little as two clicks for just 99p. Every track that customers buy on their PC is available at no extra cost on their mobile. All tracks that are purchased on mobile can also be downloaded to PC at no additional cost.

- Launch of 3FirstCut Awards - The 3 First Cut Awards is 3’s search for the next big thing in music.  Launched at an exclusive gig late last year by band du jour, the Fratellis, 21 acts have been shortlisted from over 1,900 entries to go on tour of 7 Universities in March this year.  The winning act will go on to have their single released on Fallout Recordings, a video created by a top director and the chance to perform at a music festival as well as extensive promotion on 3.

- Launch of 3FrontRoom – 3 FrontRoom is a unique initiative which saw 3 top artists (Lily Allen, All Saints and Ludacris) perform ‘secret’ gigs for 3. Fans were invited to the gigs which were recorded to create exclusive live performance videos available only on 3.

- UK’s first mobile only single – 3 worked with Planet Funk to launch the UK’s first mobile-only single. ‘Stop Me’ was available only on 3 and proved to be a big success. Had it been able to chart at the time of release, it would have entered in the top 30.

- Chamillionaire Exclusive – 3 released Chamillionaire’s ‘Ridin’ video to download exclusively, six weeks before it was available through any other channel. It achieved 45,000 downloads during this time, and the video became the most played on MTV, BET and AOL, demonstrating 3’s pivotal role in the tracks success.

 John Penberthy-Smith, Marketing Director at 3, commented “We love music, whether it’s launching new music or new talent. Clearly our customers love it too, and this music award gives us encouragement to continue to lead this growing category.”