Mobile content storefront specialist FoneStarz Media has won one of its most significant deals, having been appointed to manage the entire content downloads portal for Vodafone live! in Egypt.
FoneStarz has vertically integrated games, ringtones, video and personalisation products like wallpapers, themes and Flash Lite into one fully managed storefront, using its content management and delivery system, Daius, for the dual-language English and Arabic downloads service. The second phase of the site will see involve FoneStarz managing the App Store for the Vodafone network in Egypt, which has more than 17 million subscribers.
FoneStarz notes that this is the first time it as created an end-to-end mobile entertainment solution for an operator, and both parties claim that it gives customers the best possible browsing and retailing experience across all mobile Internet devices.
FoneStarz will bring its own licensed content, from a local market and international catalogue that includes more than 130 suppliers, and will also host, manage and aggregate content using Vodafone licenses, both local and from Group.
This co-ordinated storefront is at the heart of what we are trying to achieve as a company, says, FoneStarz CEO, Dave Moreau. We firmly believe that by pulling together all the different mobile entertainment categories under one properly managed store, we can significantly improve the mobile content experience for customers.
FoneStarz already works with Vodafone around the world, managing the ringtones and pictures business for them on Vodafone live! in the UK and other on-deck services in Ireland, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.
It says that an increasing number of mobile network operators, especially in emerging markets like Egypt, are looking to companies like FoneStarz as an outsourced services solution for the hosting and management of all or part of their downloads portals.FoneStarz has recently signed up five deals with Hutchison 3 to manage on-portal categories in the UK, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark and Austria. 
