In order to raise the appeal of the Avangard service and to provide competitive connection rates for the widest possible range of potential customers, OJSC North West Telecom is staging New Year promotions of the Avangard service in the run-up to the holiday season in the entire North-West of Russia.

The St Petersburg Branch has launched the New Year - On the Fly! promotion. All the subscribers who join the promotion between 1 and 31 December will be able to use the Avangard service at the speed of 2008 Kbps until 31 January 2008. In order to take part, one has to either connect to the Avangard service or switch to a higher tariff within it: 250 Kbps, 500 Kbps or 1100 Kbps. On 1 December, the Murmansk Branch launched the New Year - Avant-garde Style promotion, offering connection to all the service tariffs at the price of 1 rouble (excluding the modem). From 1 December, the Vologda Branch increased Internet access speeds for all active unlimited tariffs and introduced a new unlimited tariff, ADSL 56 Kbps, with the monthly subscription rate of 350 roubles. Also from 1 December, the Arkhangelsk Branch has introduced a new unlimited tariff, Avangard 256 Kbps.

New Year promotions are also staged until 31 December by other branches of OJSC North West Telecom .*

The New Year - Avant-garde Style promotion applies to the Komi, Kaliningrad, Vologda, Novgorod, Pskov, Karelia and Leningrad Regional branches of OJSC North West Telecom . In the regions serviced by those branches, the connection charge for Avangard service tariffs up until 31 December 2007 will amount to 1 rouble (including or excluding the modem, depending on the region). In the run up to the New Year, the Kaliningrad Region will enjoy two new unlimited tariffs: 330 Kbps and 660 Kbps, with a double reduction in the modem price for the entire duration of the promotion. The New Year promotion in the Arkhangelsk Branch will involve the connection charge of 500 roubles (including the modem) for all the Avangard service tariffs. In the city of Petrozavodsk, the Karelia Branch gives a month of free Internet service to those customers who switch to a higher Avangard tariff during the promotion.

OJSC North West Telecom works constantly to improve the Avangard service and to provide its customers with both a modern Internet access service and a high-quality technical support. To satisfy the needs of our customers, all the branches work to expand the tariff range and to increase Internet connection speeds for the same price levels. Moreover, the customers of the Avangard service are offered new additional services, already available from most of the Company branches: Net Games , My Pictures , My Files , My Journal . For the customers' convenience, the application procedure is greatly simplified: the services can be ordered both in any Service Centre of an OJSC NWT branch and at the company website, www.avangard-dsl.ru . Some regions ( St Petersburg , Kaliningrad) have an established dealer network to distribute the Avangard service. The Avangard service customers can access the information and technical support at the www.avangard-dsl.ru website or from the free enquiry services. Soon the Avangard service customers will be offered the new project of AvangardTV, an integrated interactive service which will include video by request, digital TV, networked video recorder and other modern services.

"Development of the broadband Internet access services is one of the most promising directions for the Company. The Avangard service was made available to the general market in the beginning of 2006, and in less than two years it has been extended to the entire North-West Region. By the end of 2007 the installed capacity of xDSL ports of OJSC North West Telecom will amount to 465 thousand ports, and in 2008 we are going to increase the capacity by another 330 thousand ports. In order to ensure a further active growth of the subscriber base, a guaranteed service quality and a timely provision of the latest services, OJSC North West Telecom is already considering its options in constructing FTTH networks that would allow to bring a complete range of services of the highest quality to every household via the fibre-optic channels," says O.V. Popov, Deputy General Director - Commercial Director of OJSC North West Telecom.