Tags: India, Yahoo, Yahoo Mail Classic, Yahoo Web IM

Yahoo! India goes local!

Launches Hindi Mail and Web IM for the Indian market

* Yahoo! Mail Classic now available in Hindi
* Yahoo! Web IM now allows users to chat anytime, anywhere with no downloading – in 9 Indian languages

New Delhi, October 30th 2007 — Yahoo! India the largest Internet brand in India, today announced a completely new Indian web experience with the availability of Yahoo! Mail in Hindi. Putting consumers at the centre of the web experience, this is a huge step from Yahoo! to localize and cater to country-specific needs. Yahoo! Mail Classic users are now being offered the option to write and read e-mail in Hindi.

With this roll out, Yahoo! Mail Classic users can now experience a complete Hindi Interface. The new Yahoo! Mail in Hindi will include all information similar to the English version. However, Hindi would give it a distinct local touch.

“We have always been focused on making it easy for people to connect to those who matter most to them. Now, with Yahoo! Mail Classic, we’re creating a more local e-mail experience. In addition, we wanted to make sure that people have the best possible Web mail experience regardless of their geographic location, preferences or system. Our product and engineering teams in India have played a crucial role in this localization,” said John Kremer, vice president, Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! Inc.

“At Yahoo!, innovation is a key driver for our product development. Yahoo! Mail in Hindi is relevant to the 200 million Indians who are expected to come online in the next few years. This will also be an attractive product for a large section of our advertisers, who want to reach out to the non - English speaking Indian population,” added Pranesh Anthapur, Chief Administrative Officer, Yahoo! India.

Besides, Yahoo! Messenger has introduced a new Web-based version of its leading instant messaging service. With no downloads required, Yahoo! Messenger for the Web (http://in.webmessenger.yahoo.com) gives people the freedom to instant message (IM) from anywhere — offices, Internet cafés, schools, airports — from any Internet-enabled computer. The service is ideal for travelers on the move and office workers with firewall constraints. The big value-add is that it will allow users to chat in nine Indian languages which include Hindi, Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Punjabi, Bengali, Marathi and Gujarati. Users can switch between these languages seamlessly along with English

This localization of the Yahoo! India portal will revolutionize user experience and invite more users to access information on a daily basis for news, reviews and events happening around them. Yahoo! India’s diverse content offering to its Hindi language users include:

* The latest News in different categories
* Daily Horoscopes & Astrology - find out what your favourite

celebrities’ stars foretell and find a dedicated section on Vastu for a better living

* Extensive cookery section - an exciting journey for the gourmet with recipes covering Continental, Indian, Regional, Sweets and Fast Food
* Health & Wellness sections covering Therapies, Health Issues and News
* Infortainment - latest Bollywood and region specific News, Previews, Reviews and, for the couch potatoes, daily TV schedules

About Yahoo! Mail

Launched in October 1997, Yahoo! Mail is the world’s largest, most popular free e-mailservice. Yahoo! Mail helps people stay in touch at home, at work, or while traveling for business or pleasure, and is available in 22 languages. Yahoo! Mail is fully integrated with Yahoo!’s many other popular services to make it easy to access all the Internet services people need.

About Yahoo! Messenger

As one of the most popular instant messaging services on the Internet, Yahoo! Messenger makes it easier than ever for people to express themselves, interact and manage relationships with friends and family. Yahoo! Messenger has a unique and proven history of innovation in instant messaging as the first to offer Webcam functionality, the first to introduce an interactive and shared experience with IMVironments®, and the first to introduce animated emoticons. Yahoo! Messenger continues to lead the marketplace by integrating with leading Yahoo! services including games, music, photos and search, and providing the greatest choice for consumers to stay connected to one another through text IM, PC-based calling, e-mail, video and mobile text messaging.

About Yahoo! India

Yahoo! India (www.yahoo.co.in), launched in June 2000, has established itself as the pioneering and leading Internet portal providing value added services for Web users in India and users abroad with special interest in India.Yahoo! India seeks to provide online products and services essential to users’ lives, and offers a full range of tools and marketing solutions for businesses to connect with Internet users globally. It presents a deep array of communications, commerce and content services that include Yahoo! India Mail, Yahoo! India Search, Yahoo! India Messenger, Yahoo! India Finance, Yahoo! India Chat, Yahoo! India Photos, Yahoo! India Answers, Yahoo! India News and Yahoo! India Search Marketing.

About Yahoo! India R&D

Yahoo! India R&D (http://bangalore.yahoo.com) was established with a mission to deliver software solutions based on product and technology innovation to create a significant business impact for Yahoo! Inc. globally. The company’s operations are divided into Yahoo! R&D India and Yahoo! Engineering Services India. The R&D group creates technologies and products that cater to our everyday needs on the Internet and help achieve sustained visible impact on a global scale. The Engineering Services group provides quality assurance services, monitors and supports all the Yahoo! applications deployed worldwide.

For details please contact:

Arathi Vedantham
Yahoo! India
Tel: +91 80 39805098
arathiv {at} yahoo-inc(.)com

Sevashree Mohapatra
Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide, Delhi
Sevashree.mohapatra {at} ogilvy(.)com