Verizon Wireless Makes Strides With Planned BroadbandAccess 3G Network Expansion

ATLANTA and BEDMINSTER, NJ — Verizon Wireless, the nation's leader in next generation technology deployment, today made several announcements about the expansion of its BroadbandAccess service. As part of Verizon Wireless' planned $1 billion investment over the next two years to rollout BroadbandAccess nationally, Verizon Wireless announced multi-million dollar agreements with Lucent Technologies and Nortel Networks to provide wireless infrastructure technology for BroadbandAccess over the next two years. Verizon Wireless announced additional BroadbandAccess agreements with SK Telecom, Citrix and Zumasys.

"BroadbandAccess builds on our strategy to provide a superior data experience for our business and individual customers," said Denny Strigl, president and CEO of Verizon Wireless. "While today our enterprise customers in San Diego and Washington, D.C. are experiencing increased productivity and realizing bottom-line business benefits, we are on target to expand our BroadbandAccess service to cover one-third of our network — approximately 75 million Americans — by the end of 2004. With our phased national rollout of BroadbandAccess over the next two years, our individual consumers will discover enhanced multi-media applications that will rival their experiences on home PCs."

BroadbandAccess will be available to business and individual customers in many major U.S. cities later this year, with additional markets phased in through 2005. Using new BroadbandAccess handsets, PDAs to be introduced later this year, and laptops equipped with PC cards, enterprise customers can use the high-speed service outside the office, from any location within the BroadbandAccess coverage area, as an extension of their corporate local area network (LAN) or intranet. Customers can download files residing behind corporate firewalls (a small PowerPoint presentation or large PDF file in less than 30 seconds), access e-mail, intranets and the Internet. Individual customers can enjoy the many fun and visual capabilities that BroadbandAccess affords, including multi-player gaming, music and video content, video messaging and other multi-media applications.

Powered by an Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO) third generation (3G) wide-area network, BroadbandAccess offers the fastest, fully mobile wireless data experience in the nation today, with average user speeds of 300-500 kilobits per second (kbps). BroadbandAccess is based on CDMA technology, a digital wireless technology commercially developed by QUALCOMM. Because it is backward compatible, customers who travel outside a BroadbandAccess area with an EV-DO device will seamlessly switch to Verizon Wireless' existing NationalAccess network, based on 1xRTT technology.

Dick Lynch, executive vice president and chief technical officer for Verizon Wireless noted, "Our investment to build the nation's fastest commercially available wide-area wireless data service, through strategic relationships with companies like Lucent, Nortel and SK Telecom, will provide our customers with a richer, incomparable wireless data experience."

BroadbandAccess service is available today in the Washington D.C. and San Diego areas, at a flat rate of $79.99 monthly access with a one-year contract. Verizon Wireless is offering its first BroadbandAccess device, the Verizon Wireless PC 5220 card, which also provides access to the NationalAccess national data network. Through March 31, 2004, Verizon Wireless customers can buy the Verizon Wireless PC 5220 card for $149.99 after $100 rebate with a two-year service agreement. Later this year, Verizon Wireless expects to offer additional BroadbandAccess devices, including a PC card from Novatel Wireless. In the coming months, Verizon Wireless expects to offer additional BroadbandAccess devices, including modem solutions for the office and a range of the latest handheld mobile devices and PDAs customized to present video, music and other content.

For more information on BroadbandAccess and Verizon Wireless data services, visit www.verizonwireless.com.  

(EDITORS: Broadcast-quality B-roll footage about Verizon Wireless' BroadbandAccess service is available online. Log onto www.thenewsmarket.com/verizonwireless to preview and request video segments, which can be received in newsrooms digitally, by tape or via satellite. This and other Verizon Wireless stories can be found at this link by searching for "Verizon Wireless.")

About Verizon Wireless
Verizon Wireless is the nation's leading provider of wireless communications. The company has the largest nationwide wireless voice and data network and 37.5 million customers. Headquartered in Bedminster, NJ, Verizon Wireless is a joint venture of Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) and Vodafone (NYSE and LSE: VOD). Find more information on the Web at www.verizonwireless.com.  To receive broadcast-quality video footage of Verizon Wireless operations, log onto www.thenewsmarket.com/verizonwireless.  

NOTE: This press release contains statements about expected future events and financial results that are forward-looking and subject to risks and uncertainties. For those statements, we claim the protection of the safe harbor for forward-looking statements contained in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The following important factors could affect future results and could cause those results to differ materially from those expressed in the forward-looking statements: materially adverse changes in economic conditions in the markets served by us, an adverse change in the ratings afforded our debt securities or those of Verizon Communications by nationally accredited ratings organizations, the effects of the substantial competition that exists in our markets, which has been intensifying, and which may intensify further as a result of local number portability regulations that allow wireless customers to retain their phone numbers when switching wireless service providers, our ability to obtain sufficient financing to satisfy our substantial capital requirements, including to fund capital expenditures, debt repayment and distributions to our owners, our ability to obtain sufficient spectrum licenses, particularly in our most densely populated areas, our ability to develop future business opportunities, including wireless data services, and to continue to adapt to the changing conditions in the wireless industry, our ability to receive satisfactory service from our key vendors and suppliers, our ability to generate additional subscribers, with acceptable levels of churn, from resellers and distributors of our service, material changes in available technology, and technology substitution that could impact the popularity and usage of our technology, our continued provision of satisfactory service to our subscribers at an acceptable cost, in order to reduce churn, the impact of continued unionization efforts with respect to our employees, regulatory developments, including new regulations that could increase our cost of doing business or reduce demand for our services, developments in connection with existing or future litigation, and changes in our accounting assumptions that regulatory agencies, including the SEC, may require or that result from changes in the accounting rules or their application, which could result in an impact on earnings.

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