Aspiro Announces Deal with LunarStorm Community

[London, ENGLAND] European mobile Internet company
Aspiro announced Monday an agreement with Sweden’s
LunarStorm Web community to provide services worth
over half a million dollars.

Run by LunarWorks, the LunarStorm community has over
a quarter of million young members who meet and chat
via the site. According to independent research company
MediaMetrix it is Sweden’s largest youth community on
the Internet.

“Our studies show that there is an enormous demand among
young people to be able to reach LunarStorm via mobile
phones — and soon we’ll be offering a number of different
mobile Internet services,” said Kjell Sallen, chief
executive of LunarWorks.

Lena Wittbjer, Aspiro’s chief executive, said that
Aspiro is selling more and more mobile Internet services
to companies based outside the traditional sphere of
telecommunications.

“Portals and other Internet companies need to become
mobile. They represent a customer group that is becoming
increasingly important to us,” said Wittbjer.

Aspiro itself has been expanding beyond its home base
in Sweden where it was founded in 1998, and now has
offices in Luxembourg and the United States. It employs
around 125 people.

The latest agreement brings Aspiro’s order book to a
healthy SEK 85 million (US $9.5 million), a target
set earlier this year. Recently, Aspiro has shown
strong growth, moving from SEK 36 million (US $4 million)
in September to today’s figure.

Aspiro develops complete mobile solutions ranging from
pre-packaged portal services to industry-specific solutions
for various organizations. It views the WAP-based mobile
Internet as being just the first stage in a major
revolution within communications.

Two of Aspiro’s products — Fleet Manager and City Guide
— won top prizes at the WAP Awards, held by WAP Forum
and IBC. Fleet Manager won first prize for Best Use of
WAP in a Business Application.