Axia announces signed project agreement with the Generalitat of Catalonia

CALGARY, Nov. 18 /CNW/ - Axia NetMedia Corporation (Axia) announced today that Xarxa Oberta, a Spanish company owned and controlled by Axia and Imagina Media Audiovisual (Imagina), has signed a 20 year services agreement with the Catalan regional government, the Generalitat of Catalonia (the Generalitat) to provide Next Generation Network (NGN) services to the Generalitat and to Retail Service Providers (RSPs) in Catalonia.

Xarxa Oberta will connect 696 Generalitat sites in the fields of health, education, justice and safety in 95 municipalities of Catalonia. For the first two years of the network project, Xarxa Oberta will integrate 1,200 kilometres of existing fibre infrastructure and in years four and five of the project an additional 650 kilometres of fibre infrastructure will be constructed.  The service commitment from the Generalitat is €253 million over the period.  Xarxa Oberta also will adapt and equip the fibre infrastructure to provide NGN services to RSPs from large international operators to local community cable operators. 

Axia expects that after the completion of the five year network implementation phase the pre-tax earnings from this investment is likely to be within the range of €1.0 million to €4.0 million per year. The primary variable in this respect will be the amount of wholesale sales of NGN services to RSPs.

Art Price, Chairman and CEO of Axia commented, "The Xarxa Oberta project is the first step towards the Catalan goal of connecting every home and business in the region by building a fibre grid that will interconnect 95 of 900 municipalities in Catalonia.  This will position Axia and our partner Imagina to be the NGN infrastructure partner of the Catalan government to extend the grid to the remaining municipalities, participate in Fibre to the Premise opportunities and enable wireless services."

Jean-Michel Soulier, President of Axia Networks France added, "Catalonia's strong economic base has a great deal of future potential and provides us with a solid foundation to grow our European wholesale business as we believe Axia's value proposition will be attractive to large international operators by interconnecting our French and Catalan networks.  As well, the Xarxa Oberta project demonstrates how our successful NGN model works not only in France but could be the right solution for a variety of European countries and regions."

Axia sells Real Broadband™ and passive services on Next Generation Networks that have implemented the Axia NGN Solution. The Axia NGN Solution has been implemented in Alberta, France and Singapore. Axia trades on the Toronto Stock Exchange under the symbol "AXX".

This News Release contains forward-looking statements, including, without limitation, statements containing the words "should", "believe", "anticipate", "may", "plan", "will", "continue", "intend", "expect", "estimate" and other similar expressions which constitute "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities laws.  These statements are based on our current expectations, estimates, forecasts and assumptions about the operating environment, economies and markets in which we operate and are subject to important assumptions, risks and uncertainties that are difficult to predict.  Examples of these statements would include those where Axia forecasts its success and timing in winning new NGN business, the timing of completion and estimated total costs of our networks, the revenues and operating costs associated with these networks over time, and Axia's ability to generate future cash flows and avail itself of other financing alternatives given current market conditions.  The assumptions, risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking information, include, but are not limited to, changes in customer markets, changes in demand for our services, our inability to deliver services in a timely and cost efficient manner, technological change, general economic conditions and other risks detailed from time to time in our ongoing filings with the Canadian securities regulatory authorities, including those in our Annual Information Form, which filings can be found at www.sedar.com.  Given these assumptions, risks and uncertainties, readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements.  Unless otherwise required by applicable securities laws, we undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements either as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

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For more information, visit its website at www.axia.com or contact:
Dawn Tinling
VP, Investor Relations and Communications
Axia NetMedia Corporation
[phone]
[email protected]