• One of the largest ever Google Mail deployments
• Over 7GB of storage and @virginmedia.com email addresses for customers

Virgin Media is to start offering enhanced email services to its four million home broadband customers in partnership with Google. With over 7000MB (7GB) of storage and @virginmedia.com email addresses available for customers for the first time, Virgin Media’s new email service will be one of the largest deployments of Google Partner Edition Apps*, which allows businesses as well as individuals to use Google’s communication and collaboration applications under their own domain names.

As well as greater storage, Virgin Media’s broadband customers will benefit from advanced email search, the ability to stay up to date with emails via their mobiles, anti-virus, spam and phishing filters and up to 10 @virginmedia.com email addresses for each broadband household. Customers accessing their email through the web-based interface will also be able to take advantage of instant messaging features and organise emails into threaded conversations.

Available to all of Virgin Media’s home broadband customers, the enhanced services will be piloted by the first 20,000 new customers to sign up from today, with full launch to all new customers shortly after. Existing customers will then be migrated across to the new service at no extra cost and will be able to keep their existing @blueyonder.co.uk, @ntlworld.com or @virgin.net email addresses or choose to sign up for new @virginmedia.com email addresses.

The agreement complements the existing and successful search partnership between Virgin Media and Google, as the two companies continue to work together to explore a range of additional services and applications.

Alex Green, Executive Director of Online for Virgin Media, said: “As the UK’s largest home broadband provider, we’re committed to providing the very best online experience to our customers. With email so important in everyday life, we’re delighted to be working with Google and launching a brand new, feature-rich and easy to use email service. We look forward to exploring future services with Google and continuing to deliver market-leading communications and entertainment to our customers.”

Doug Lucas, Strategic Partner Development Director for Google said: "Virgin Media is one of the UK’s leading ISPs and this is a great partnership between two companies focused on innovation. We look forward to rolling out new features for the benefit of all Virgin Media’s customers."

To find out more about Virgin Media’s products and services visit www.virginmedia.com or call 0800 052 2525.

Notes to editors

Media contacts
Virgin Media Consumer PR:
Asam Ahmad
+44 (0) 20 7299 5707
Asam.ahmad@virginmedia.co.uk

Virgin Media Corporate PR:
Emma Hutchinson
+44 (0) 20 7299 5702
Emma.hutchinson@virginmedia.co.uk

About Virgin Media
With almost 10 million customers, Virgin Media is the UK's first quad-play provider of broadband, TV, phone and mobile.

The company is the largest residential broadband provider in the UK, using a unique fibre optic cable network to deliver next generation ultrafast internet access of up to 50Mb to just over half of all homes. Combined with a high speed ADSL service and mobile broadband products, Virgin Media is able to offer broadband internet access to virtually the entire country.

Virgin Media has the UK’s most advanced TV on demand service and is the only TV platform to carry BBC iPlayer. It is the second largest provider of pay TV, was the first to launch a high definition TV service and offers a high-specification, HD-ready V+ personal video recorder.

The company operates the most popular virtual mobile network in the UK which, when launched, was the world’s first such mobile phone service. It is also one of the largest fixed-line home phone providers in the country.

Virgin Media also owns Virgin Media Television (VMtv) which runs eight entertainment channels, including Virgin1, Living, Bravo and Challenge. VMtv is a 50 per cent joint partner with BBC Worldwide in UKTV, which consists of ten channels including Dave, G.O.L.D., Watch and Alibi.

With operations based entirely in the UK, Virgin Media Inc. is listed on the NASDAQ Stock Market (VMED).

 For more information, go to www.virginmedia.com

About Google Apps

* Google Apps allows businesses as well as individuals to use Google's communication and collaboration applications under their own domain names. All services are hosted by Google and are available to users via any internet-connected computer and many mobile devices. Google Apps includes the following services:

• Gmail™ - provides gigabytes of email storage, highly effective spam filtering and powerful search;
• Google Calendar™ - allows easy coordination of work or class schedules, meetings and events online;
• Google Talk™ - supports free PC-to-PC voice calls and instant messaging;
• Google Docs™ - allows users to create and collaborate on documents, spreadsheets and presentations in real-time in a single place on the web.

Millions of consumers and business customers around the world rely on the speed, ease of use and innovative features of Google applications to organize their life and stay in touch with friends and colleagues.