US : Hungarian operator Pannon GSM and Nokia have demonstrated the first public operator WCDMA 3G call in Hungary. The demonstration was carried out by Pannon Chief Technology Officer Jozsef Huszlicska using the commercially available Nokia 6650 phone.

During the demonstration, a series of services were on display including streaming, Internet browsing, downloading, and MMS. Services used data speeds of up to 380 kilobits/sec.

"This landmark highlights Pannon GSM's innovativeness and ability to adopt new technologies. We continue to be highly committed to the needs of our customers by offering state-of-the-art and exciting services irrespective of the underlying technology," says Klaus Rasmussen, Chief Executive Officer, Pannon GSM. "We will monitor the requirements of our subscribers and our technical decisions will be taken based on that and on the business environment when the time is ripe. This is the latest for the numerous milestones we have marked with Nokia in our ten years of fruitful cooperation."

Additionally the two companies have made an agreement for Nokia to provide a full WCDMA 3G testbed for Pannon GSM, including both 3G radio and core network equipment. This will enable Pannon GSM to further explore and evaluate the technical and service delivery capabilities of 3G technology.

"We are proud to be co-operating with Pannon GSM in this latest achievement and in serving their customers at the highest level," says László Tolnay, Senior Account Manager, Nokia Networks. "This also demonstrates that Nokia is already well prepared and able to support the operators in offering 3G mobile services through both EDGE and WCDMA 3G."