Symbian appoints new Chief Executive

LONDON, United Kingdom – 18 May 2005 – The Board of Symbian is today pleased to announce the appointment of Nigel Clifford to the post of Chief Executive Officer. Mr Clifford will take up his position in June 2005.

Mr Clifford has wide experience of successful leadership across a number of sectors, including the technology sector. Mr Clifford was appointed Chief Executive of Tertio Telecoms Ltd in July 2000. Tertio Telecoms is an international telecoms software product and services company backed by Apax Partners, Advent International and GE Equity. Mr Clifford led the sale of Tertio Telecoms to Evolving Systems Inc. in November 2004. Tertio Telecoms develops and markets software-based solutions that improve the roll-out, management and billing of voice and data services for fixed, cable and mobile operators. Customers include Hutchison Global (“3”), T-Mobile, Telenor, Telewest and Vodafone Group.

Before Tertio Telecoms, Mr Clifford spent two years as Senior Vice President, Service Delivery with international telecommunications company Cable & Wireless, serving on the company’s United Kingdom Board. Mr Clifford successfully led a 2,000 person organisation, managed a capital program of more than £200m and was responsible for delivering all customers’ orders to, from and in the United Kingdom.

Mr Clifford spent five years from 1992 as Chief Executive of the Glasgow Royal Infirmary University National Health Service Trust, one of the UK’s largest hospital trusts, employing more than 5,000 staff in five city centre hospitals to provide the city of Glasgow with the full range of general and specialist medical services.

Prior to 1992 Mr Clifford spent eleven years with British Telecom, most latterly as Head of Business Strategy and Market Development for British Telecom’s Mobile Communications business unit, and before that as Senior Strategist in the Chairman's office.

Mr Clifford is a graduate of Cambridge University and holds an MBA from Strathclyde University.

Sir Peter Gershon, Independent Non-Executive Chairman, Symbian, said:
"On behalf of the Board of Symbian I am delighted to welcome Nigel Clifford as Symbian's new Chief Executive Officer. The Board conducted a wide-ranging search for a Chief Executive Officer with the right experience and balance of skills to take Symbian into its next stage of development and Nigel was our unanimous choice. Symbian's latest results show shipments of Symbian OS phones are growing rapidly, earning Symbian OS a leading position in the global market for smartphone software. Symbian's next challenge is to achieve a leading position in the higher volume, lower cost, mid-range phones market segment. Nigel Clifford's impressive track record in leading international technology organisations to deliver both complex products and excellent commercial results give Nigel the expertise and experience to lead Symbian successfully in the future."

Nigel Clifford said:
"I am delighted to be appointed Chief Executive Officer of Symbian. I am very impressed by the momentum Symbian is achieving and I am looking forward to the challenge of leading Symbian as the mobile market continues its rapid evolution."

- Ends -

Notes to Editors

Nigel Clifford appointment

Mr Clifford succeeds David Levin who left Symbian in March 2005 to take up the post of Chief Executive of United Business Media Plc.

Latest Symbian information

On 10th May 2005 Symbian announced financial and operational highlights of its Q1 2005 performance:

• Shipments of Symbian OS phones reached 6.75m (Q1 2004 – 2.40m); year on year growth of more than 180%, taking the installed base of Symbian OS phones to more than 32m phones.
  
  
• At the end of March, 48 phones were shipping (Q1 2004 – 18 phones) to more than 200 network operators around the world from nine Symbian OS licensees: BenQ, Fujitsu, Mitsubishi, Motorola, Nokia, Panasonic, Sendo, Siemens and Sony Ericsson.
  
  
• At the end of Q1 2005, the number of commercially available third party applications for Symbian OS phones had reached 3,804 (end Q1 2004 – 1,962 applications)
  
  
• Of the 48 Symbian OS phones shipping at the end of Q1 2005, 12 were shipping to network operators in Japan and across Europe for use on 3G networks.
  
  
• During Q1 2005, nine new phones based on Symbian OS commenced shipping from four licensees (Fujitsu, Mitsubishi, Panasonic and Nokia).
  
  
• Symbian launched Symbian OS v9, with its enhanced security model and advanced enterprise capabilities. Symbian OS v9 is targeted at higher volume, mid-tier phones for cost-effective network operator deployment of value-added services and content.
  
  
• At the end of Q1 2005, 41 phones and variants based on Symbian OS were under development by 11 licensees (see Notes to Editors for definitions) (Q1 2004 – 30 phones and variants under development by 9 licensees).

To view the full information:
Symbian OS shipments rise 180% to 6.75m

About Symbian

Symbian is a software licensing company that develops and licenses Symbian OS, the global open industry standard operating system for advanced, data-enabled mobile phones.

Symbian licenses Symbian OS to the world's leading handset manufacturers. The following Symbian OS licensees have Symbian OS-based mobile phones in production and / or in development: Arima, BenQ, Fujitsu for NTT DoCoMo FOMA, LG, Lenovo, Mitsubishi, Motorola, Nokia, Panasonic, Sendo, Sharp, Siemens, Samsung and Sony Ericsson. In the first quarter of 2005, more than 6.75m Symbian OS-based mobile phones were sold worldwide, taking the installed base of Symbian OS phones to more than 32 million.

Symbian has its headquarters in London, United Kingdom with offices in the United States, Europe, Israel, Australia and Asia (Bangalore, Beijing, Seoul and Tokyo).
For further information about Symbian:
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press@symbian.com

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