LONDON, August 4 /PRNewswire/ --

- Major Future Proof Network Investment in the Regions

- Improved 3G Voice and Data Coverage

Orange today announced it will be transforming its 3G network
across Scotland, Northern Ireland and North-East England. The improved 3G
network infrastructure will bring faster and even more reliable voice and
data services to the different locations.

The enhanced network in Scotland, Northern Ireland and
North-East England will enable Orange customers, living, working or
travelling across these areas to experience faster 3G data service. Further
enhancements include:

- More reliable combined voice and data service

- 99% call set-up success rate

- Faster variant of 3G/HSDPA will be rolled out and will support mobile
broadband in the very near future

The Orange 3G network includes cities and towns, as well as
major roads, rail routes, business parks, conference centres, hotels and
airports. 3G access is really important to Orange and its customers as more
and more people rely on both voice and data communications while out and
about for work or pleasure.

"A robust and reliable network is at the heart of everything
we do at Orange and we are dedicated to ensuring our customers in each and
every region of the UK feel the benefit of this. We are investing heavily to
improve our network and this investment is one step closer to our goal of
becoming the best UK network for coverage and reliability by 2009," said
Peter Marsden, vice president IT & Networks.

Orange 2G/3G and HSDPA network need to knows:

    - Orange has the largest integrated 3G/2.5G network in the UK covering
      99% of the UK population

    - Orange invests over GBP1million every working day to develop the
      network

    - Orange will be installing over 450 new 2G and 3G sites over the next 12
      months to ensure customers can make calls, send texts and access mobile
      broadband

    - Orange is working towards its 3G/HSDPA network speed targets of up to
      7.2Mbps in the top 30 UK cities; 2Mbps for 80% of entire UK population
      and will start rolling out a staggering 14.4Mbps by the end of 2009



While the 3G network improvement takes place any vital
downtime in each of the regions will be fully communicated to all customers
well in advance. The 2G network will still be available throughout the
process and the changes will have limited affect on 2G access or voice calls.
Orange network engineers will be hard at work to ensure there is minimum
disruption to customers and once complete, customers will not have to do a
thing apart from enjoy an even better 3G service from Orange.

About Orange

Orange is a key brand of the France Telecom Group, providing mobile,
broadband, fixed, business and entertainment services across Europe. It is
one of the world's leading telecommunications operators with more than 170
million customers on five continents.

In June, 2006, Orange became the single brand for mobile, broadband and
multi-play offers. In addition, Orange Business Services became the new
banner for business communications solutions. Orange Business Services is
present in 166 countries with network reach in 220.

In the UK, Orange provides high quality GSM coverage to 99% of the UK
population. At the end of December 2007, Orange had over 16.8 million
customers in the UK - 15.6 million active mobile customers and nearly 1.14
million broadband customers.

Orange and any other Orange product or service names included in this
material are trade marks of Orange Personal Communications Services Limited.

Further information about Orange and France Telecom can be found on the
Orange website at www.orange.co.uk or the France Telecom website at
http://www.francetelecom.com

LONDON, August 4 /PRNewswire/ --