MOSTAR – the First Tournament Based Mobile Gaming Community Portal in China
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Singapore, 3 May 2007 - Ozura Mobile ("Ozura"), a leading international publisher and developer of mobile entertainment, and ChinaByte today announced the official launch of its first and exclusive tournament based mobile gaming community portal "MOSTAR" in China.
MOSTAR runs on FunlogiX, the proprietary Tournament Based Mobile Gaming Community (TOMOGIC) platform developed by Ozura which provides telcos and partners with a platform to build and manage mobile gaming community. FunlogiX also provides full-fledged suites of gaming services which are customizable to each telecommunication company's commercial and marketing requirement.
In contrast with Ozura's previous deployments with major telcos such as Maxis, Indosat, XL and AIS, MOSTAR differs by being the first community incorporated with virtual currency charging system. MOSTAR uses its own virtual currency called "M coin" which is served as the prepaid credit for users to download their desired mobile games over the community portal. In the next phase of MOSTAR, "M coin" can also be purchased via scratch cards, IVR (Interactive Voice Response), credit cards as well as bank cards.
"With the implementation of this new charging system, this has proven that FunlogiX is very flexible in terms of customization to meet different clients' requirements. This new system enables us to work closer with ChinaByte to further increase and improve our gaming distribution and market share coverage in China. Furthermore, we can respond effectively by enhancing the Funlogix adaptation level with future upgrades and enhancements" said H.E.Mah, Ozura's Vice President of Marketing.
MOSTAR offers users with a wide range of mobile games including tournament, multiplayer and standalone games. The first selected tournament game is Spot Check. This game's storyline is based on the Gempak gang's reaction to a random spot check, a random and sudden search for items that are deemed illegal by the school systems. The Spot Check game is pre-destined to be a hit title among casual gamers and fans of the comic alike.
In addition to the launch of Spot Check, a multiplayer game The Duel Online is also presented in MOSTAR. The Duel Online, a highly colorful turn-based strategy game, is playable in both solo and multiplayer modes with the latter boasting great interactive features including but not limited to uploading of scores, an integrated lobby area, chatting and a buddy list. The gameplay is simplistic but strategy is needed to truly get a feel for the game and its inherent challenge.
Mr. Lee, Chief Executive Officer of ChinaByte commented "This partnership with Ozura emphasizes both parties' commitment to significantly expand the mobile data market with pioneering partnerships. In addition to that, it is equally paramount that we have a firm belief in the mobile gaming and entertainment segment which will be the key drivers to mass market usage of mobile data. Mobile gaming represents the next step in the evolution of the games industry, by adding interactivity, and mobility to traditional gaming options."
China had 449 million cell phone users as of October 2006, more than the populations of Japan and the U.S. combined and China Mobile, the world's largest mobile operator, itself has surpassed the total population of the U.S., which subscriber base grew to 301 million. The number of handset users in China is expected to rise by 11% to more than 500 million in 2007 and will add another 160 million users from next year until 2010, taking the total to 660 million.
"ChinaByte is one of the top 10 service providers in China. The amalgamation of Ozura's technology and ChinaByte's close partnership with China Mobile as well as their strong marketing channels in China, we are definitely positive on the future of the mobile gaming community in China," said Mah.
For more information, please visit http://fun.mostar.cn
About Ozura Mobile
Ozura is a leading international developer and publisher for mobile games and game developer engine to carriers, aggregators, mobile phone manufacturers and service providers. The company creates games for mobile phones based on the J2ME, BREW and Symbian platforms. Ozura's games are available all over the world through its distribution network of partners spanning across 130 countries. It is expected that the growth of mobile phones supporting these platforms will exceed one billion units worldwide in 2008. For more information, visit www.ozura.com.
About ChinaByte
ChinaByte is a leader company of IT online media, wireless value added and IT information services provider in China. The company based on the biggest IT gateway website yesky.com & chinabyte.com, provides IT content, internet advertising issuances, IT business quoted price, wireless value added services, consultation services to their subscribers, enterprises users and government organization. ChinaByte's two large web portals have been constantly selected by the CNNIC evaluation system as National Big Ten websites. At present, the websites receive 11 million page views from 3 million subscribers daily, which positioned ChinaByte as one of China mainland's most popular Internet brands.
Contact: Ms LiLing See
Ozura Mobile
llsee@ozura.com