LHS, a provider of telecommunications billing and customer care systems and Alcatel (Paris: CGEP.PA and NYSE: ALA) announced today that they have extended their strategic partnership to offer a combined pre-post-paid convergent billing solution for simplified and cost-optimized billing operations.

Stéphane Terranova, President of Alcatel’s integration and services activities, commented: “Today, mobile operators need to compensate for the steady decline in revenue from voice services and reduce the cost of operations. Having a single billing system for both prepaid and postpaid customers will enable operators to increase operational efficiency. At the same time, the convergent solution will help operators to launch new pre- and postpaid services to fight fierce competition with faster time-to-market, and increase revenues. Alcatel has selected LHS’s BSCS for its proven superior functionality and excellent performance in the IT field, which perfectly fits with Alcatel’s real time billing leadership and over 10 years of expertise in the network field.”

The new solution combines LHS’s billing and customer care system, BSCS iX and Alcatel’s Payment Suite 4.4 with Alcatel’s project management and integration skills to provide an end-to-end convergent billing solution from customer management to network interaction. The convergent solution includes features such as real-time call control, full real-time convergent rating engine, and unified provisioning and customer care for prepaid and postpaid customers.

The joint solution provides an all-in-one billing system that will allow operators to manage rating, billing and customer interaction from one central point, thereby enabling them to significantly reduce operating expenditures. It also allows real-time control of the subscriber’s invoice to reduce fraud and bad debts, and gives the customer clear visibility in real-time of his spending. Operators will also be able to provide an attractive hybrid billing service offering, tailored to its subscribers’ profiles and the type of service requested, thus, enhancing the operator’s marketing capabilities and reactivity.

Wolfgang Kroh, LHS’s Chief Operating Officer, added: “We are delighted to announce this new joint initiative. Alcatel has a wealth of experience in integrating our billing and customer care system, BSCS, to service providers worldwide. Today, service providers want to be able to offer the full range of services across their customer base, whether pre- or postpaid. Customers will find it attractive to be able to easily switch between pre- and postpaid billing.”

About LHS
LHS is a leading provider of telecom customer care and billing systems across the wireless, wireline, and IP telecom markets worldwide. Our deep industry knowledge and world-class business support systems are leading the race for convergence, supporting a complete range of business models across the mix of prepaid and postpaid services. LHS builds innovative systems that enable our customers to introduce new services fast, helping to drive revenues up while keeping operational costs to a minimum. LHS was awarded “Best Billing or Customer Care Solution” by the GSM Association in Cannes and the IIR World Billing Awards for its “Overall Best Contribution to Billing” in London in 2005. LHS is an independent software vendor (ISV) with headquarters in Frankfurt, Germany, and solution centers in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. For more information, please visit www.lhsgroup.com

About Alcatel
Alcatel provides communications solutions to telecommunication carriers, Internet service providers and enterprises for delivery of voice, data and video applications to their customers or employees. Alcatel brings its leading position in fixed and mobile broadband networks, applications and services, to help its partners and customers build a user-centric broadband world. With sales of EURO 13.1 billion and 58,000 employees in 2005, Alcatel operates in more than 130 countries. For more information, visit Alcatel on the Internet: http://www.alcatel.com