Panasonic Agrees to Adopt AeroMobile™ In-Flight Mobile Communications Technology

September 20, 2005

Annapolis, Maryland and Oslo, Norway—AeroMobile™, the in-flight mobile phone service developed by Telenor and ARINC, today announced the Panasonic Avionics Corporation has signed a letter of intent to use AeroMobile’s in-flight mobile communications technology. Under the agreement Panasonic can immediately integrate AeroMobile’s technology into its market-leading S3000 AVOD in-flight entertainment system, as well as its newest generation X series systems, efx, eX2 and X–wireless.

The AeroMobile solution allows passengers to use their mobile (cell) phones to make in-flight calls, or send SMS text messages, anywhere in the world. It initially uses the Inmarsat "classic" service already fitted to over 1,900 airliners worldwide. As a scalable solution, it will be able to offer broadband services such as GPRS data transmission for PDAs and Blackberries, as well as increased system capacity in the future.

Graham Lake, ARINC Vice President, Europe, Middle East, and Africa, stated, “This agreement marks a major step forward for our industry, and the solution Panasonic and AeroMobile will provide to customers will be second to none—offering real service benefits to airlines and their passengers. We look forward to working with Panasonic on further developments when AeroMobile goes live.”

Paul Margis, President of Panasonic Avionics Corporation, said, “Many of our customers have for many years desired that their passengers’ personal mobile phones would operate onboard the aircraft. AeroMobile has been working hard to develop and push forward regulatory approval for this service. We are confident that many of our customers will wish to install this mobile phone system. We are also confident that with our development and manufacturing capability we can help bring this product to market faster, certify and install it on more aircraft types, and provide maintenance support to these systems worldwide.”

The service will initially offer the GSM protocol supported by over 70% of the world’s mobile phones. Panasonic and AeroMobile plan to work together to add support for other mobile phone protocols including GPRS, CDMA and 3G protocols to meet customer requirements.

Panasonic Avionics Corporation is the world's leading supplier of in-flight entertainment and communication systems. Headquartered in Bothell, Washington, Panasonic Avionics Corporation maintains corporate and engineering offices in Lake Forest, California; regional centers in Dallas, Singapore, London, Tokyo and Dubai; and field service, maintenance and sales facilities throughout the world. System production facilities are in Osaka, Japan. Panasonic Avionics Corporation is a subsidiary of Panasonic Corporation of North America (PNA). Based in Secaucus, NJ, PNA is the principal North American subsidiary of Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. (NYSE: MC) and the hub of Panasonic's U.S. marketing, sales and service and R&D operations. Additional information on Panasonic Avionics Corporation is available at www.panasonic.aero. For information on Matsushita and Panasonic, visit www.panasonic.com.

With headquarters in Oslo, Norway, Telenor is an international provider of high quality telecommunications, data, and media services, with expanding operations in international mobile and satellite communications. Telenor is one of Norway's largest companies with 2003 revenues of approximately U.S. $7.6 billion and a workforce of 20,600 located in Norway and abroad. Telenor is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange (TEL) and NASDAQ (TELN). For more information, visit the Telenor web site at www.telenor.com.

ARINC Incorporated is the world leader in transportation communications and systems engineering. The company develops and operates communications and information processing systems and provides systems engineering and integration solutions to five key industries: airports, aviation, defense, government, and surface transportation. Founded to provide reliable and efficient radio communications for the airlines, ARINC is headquartered in Annapolis, Maryland, and operates key regional offices in London and Singapore, with over 3,000 employees worldwide. ARINC is ISO 9001:2000 Certified.