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KYOCERA Wireless and Virgin Mobile USA "Up the Ante" with Virgin Mobile Festival Special Edition Wild Card
15,000 Tricked Out Cell Phones Are Music to Fans' Ears with Exclusive Access at Virgin Mobile Festival, Free Music Downloads and More
SAN DIEGO and WARREN, N.J. - (May 29, 2008) - What do Virgin Mobile USA customers and Sir Richard Branson have in common? Branson and the lucky 15,000 customers who buy a Virgin Mobile Festival Special Edition Wild Card phone by Kyocera Wireless will all have special access to the Virgin Mobile Guest Lounge at the upcoming Virgin Mobile Festival on August 9-10 in Baltimore.* Customers simply have to show their new handset for admittance to the special guest area at the Festival, where Kyocera Wireless continues its 3-year run as the premier handset sponsor.
Available nationwide from May 25 through July 31 exclusively at Best Buy and Best Buy Mobile stores for $99.99, the Virgin Mobile Festival Special Edition Wild Card also comes with 50 music downloads from eMusic and a one-year subscription to SPIN Magazine.
"With the introduction of the Virgin Mobile Festival Special Edition Wild Card, we've made a highly popular phone even more desirable. The killer custom design, together with a host of perks designed specially for music lovers, makes this new handset as hot a ticket as Virgin Mobile Festival itself," said Woozae Kim, director of strategic marketing and integration, handsets for Virgin Mobile USA. "We're thrilled to partner with Kyocera to put Virgin Mobile Festival into the hands of consumers across the country."
The Limited Edition handset will be easy to spot with slick white casing, blue keypad buttons, exclusive wallpapers, and graffiti-style Festival graphics around an internal screen that imitates a concert stage. One of the Limited Edition's many wild features is the easy texting that has made the original Wild Card such a success. All Wild Card handsets open lengthwise to reveal a full QWERTY keypad, ideal for texting and instant messaging. All Wild Cards also include a 1.3 megapixel camera and support streaming music tracks.
"Kyocera has been a part of the Virgin Mobile Festival since the beginning and this limited edition of the Wild Card is absolutely befitting of how grand the event has become," said Tom Maguire, divisional vice president of global marketing at Kyocera Wireless Corp. "The Wild Card is already an extremely popular phone, but adding this iconic styling and the perks that come with this limited supply make it just that much more appealing. We don't expect these 15,000 phones to last long on Best Buy's shelves."
Additional information about the Virgin Mobile Festival Special Edition Wild Card is available at www.virginmobileusa.com or Kyocera Cell Phones - Kyocera Wild Card / M1000 wireless phone where fans also can sign up to receive event updates. The two-day Virgin Mobile Festival will be held August 9-10 at Pimlico RaceCourse in Baltimore, Maryland. The largest music and arts festival on the East Coast, this year's Festival headliners include Bob Dylan, Foo Fighters, Jack Johnson, Kanye West, Nine Inch Nails and Stone Temple Pilots. Fans can check out the full lineup and sign up for news and updates at www.virginmobilefestival.com
About Virgin Mobile USA
Virgin Mobile USA, Inc. (NYSE: VM), through its operating company Virgin Mobile USA, L.P., offers more than 5 million customers control, flexibility and choice in wireless service, rich data content and innovative products without annual contracts. Voice pricing plans range from monthly plans with unlimited nights and weekends to pay as you go by-the-minute offers, allowing consumers to adjust how and what they pay according to their needs. Virgin Mobile's full slate of smart, stylish and affordable handsets, including the Wild Card, Slash and Cyclops are available at top retailers in more than 40,000 locations nationwide and online at www.virginmobileusa.com, with Top-Up cards available at more than 140,000 locations.
J.D. Power and Associates ranked Virgin Mobile highest in customer satisfaction among wireless prepaid services in both 2006 and 2007, and its customers report a 90% satisfaction rate. Virgin Mobile contributes a portion of profits from downloadable content to The RE*Generation, its pro-social initiative to help homeless youth, and provides postage-paid return envelopes in every new phone package for customers to recycle old phones. Virgin Mobile USA's national coverage is powered by the nationwide Sprint PCS network.
About Kyocera Wireless Corp.
Kyocera Wireless Corp. is a leading supplier of innovative, feature-rich wireless devices and accessories for customers worldwide. The company is a wholly owned subsidiary of Kyocera International Inc., which acquired QUALCOMM Incorporated's CDMA consumer wireless phone business in February 2000. Based in San Diego, Kyocera Wireless leverages Japan's history of creating advanced consumer technologies around humanism and respect for the environment and blending them with a Western entrepreneurialism and style, resulting in a unique design language and a natural, user-friendly interface. For more information, please visit www.kyocera-wireless.com.
Kyocera Corporation (NYSE: KYO), the parent and global headquarters of the Kyocera Group, was founded in 1959 as a producer of advanced ceramics. By combining these engineered materials with metals and plastics, and integrating them with other technologies, Kyocera has become a leading supplier of telecommunications equipment, semiconductor packages, electronic components, laser printers, copiers, solar energy systems and industrial ceramics. During the year ended March 31, 2008, Kyocera Corporation's consolidated net sales totaled approximately US$12.9 billion (JP¥1,290,436 million) with net income of approximately US$1.0 billion (JP¥107,244 million).
* Access to the Virgin Mobile Guest Lounge does not include the cost of admission or travel to or from the Virgin Mobile Festival.
© 2008 Kyocera Wireless Corp. All rights reserved. Kyocera is a registered trademark of Kyocera Corporation. All other marks are properties of their respective owners.
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