Lingo Sets New Price Benchmark

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Lingo Sets New Price Benchmark

Greg Galitzine brought to my attention some interesting news from Lingo. Apparently, Lingo is offering unlimited worldwide calling for an amazingly low price of $7.95/Month. This sets a new benchmark for Vonage, Packet8, Broadvoice, etc. to follow.

Essentially, an international college student in the USA can sign up for this service for $7.95, have his or her parents also sign-up for $7.95, and then they can stay in touch and talk for an unlimited amount of time for just $15.90 per month! That's less than the unlimited monthly fee for just 1 Vonage sign-up. Of course, this Lingo plan is designed more for calling Lingo "friends and family" (think MCI Friends and Family) and not designed for unlimited outbound calling. You can of course make outbound calls using the cheap per minute rates set by Lingo, i.e. $0.03/minute for U.S. calls. And you can still receive unlimited inbound calls as well.

Greg Galitzine's Blog will have more details soon so go check it out. in the meantime, here's the press release:

Lingo “Links” Internet Telephone Subscribers For Unlimited Worldwide Calling at $7.95/Month

McLean, VA—September 21, 2004— Lingo, the high-speed Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service originated by Primus Telecommunications, Inc., today began offering a new “Lingo Link” calling service that allows any two Lingo customers to call each other from anywhere in the world – and talk for an unlimited amount of time -- for only $7.95 a month.

Anyone with a high-speed broadband connection and an ordinary phone can subscribe to Lingo Link. The service is designed for individuals who place frequent calls to certain people (e.g. families with military personnel stationed overseas, college students living away from home, small businesses with geographically dispersed office locations, and families with relatives living overseas).

Lingo Link allows subscribers to build their own calling network or “domain,” made up of callers in the same country or multiple, far off destinations. If two Lingo subscribers have Lingo Link, they may place unlimited calls to one another--wherever they are in the world--all at the rate of $7.95 a month. When Lingo Link subscribers call non-subscribers, they pay Lingo’s competitive long distance VoIP rates ($0.03 per minute for calls to the U.S. and Canada, or Lingo’s low per minute rates to hundreds of international destinations).

Offered free for the first month, and $7.95 per month thereafter, Lingo Link service includes:

· Unlimited calls to other Lingo subscribers
· All incoming calls
· Call forwarding, call waiting
· Voicemail
· A Lingo Analog Telephone Adapter (“ATA”)
· 24 x 7 customer and technical support services
· Emergency Calling Service
· Online account management
· 411 Directory Assistance ($.75 per call)

Commenting on the potential demand for such a service, Primus Co-President John Melick said, “We are finding that many of our customers are so enthusiastic about VoIP service that
they want to encourage relatives and friends to sign on, so that they can all make free calls to one another. What inspires us the most as a global Internet telephone service provider is the positive impact services like these can have in altering the state of business and personal
relationships globally.”

A Summary of Lingo Calling Plans
Lingo plans, all offering unlimited calling to other Lingo subscribers, and all made available free for the first month, include:
HOME PLANS:
· Unlimited Plan for $19.95 -- Unlimited calling to U.S., Canada, Western Europe, plus all calling features.
· Unlimited Asia for $34.95 -- (New) Unlimited calling to U.S., U.K. and many Asian countries, and all calling features.
· Basic Plan for $14.95 -- 500 outgoing minutes to U.S., Canada and Western Europe, and all calling features.
· Lingo Link for $7.95 – (New) Free calls to Lingo customers plus selected features.
OFFICE PLANS:
· Business Unlimited Plan for $49.95 -- Unlimited calls to U.S., Canada, Western Europe, plus a dedicated fax line and great calling features for small businesses.
· Business Unlimited International for $99.95 -- Includes everything in the Business Unlimited plan, plus calls to many Asian and South American countries.

INTERNATIONAL PLANS:
· Unlimited Plan for $19.95 -- Unlimited calling to Western Europe, U.S. and Canada, and all calling features.
· Unlimited Asia for $34.95 (New) -- Unlimited calling to U.S., U.K. and many Asian countries, and all calling features.
· International Unlimited for $79.95 -- Includes everything in the core Unlimited Plan plus calls to over 30 international countries.

Like all Lingo customers, those who subscribe to Lingo Link may also select one or more Lingo “Universal Numbers”:
· U.S. Universal Numbers are available in over 220 area codes in 46 states.
· International Universal Numbers are currently available in Canada, Australia, Brazil, France, Guatemala, Hong Kong, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Puerto Rico, South Korea, Taiwan, and the U.K.

To learn more about Lingo, and to sign up online for the service, visit http://www.Lingo.com

About Primus and VoIP
Primus Telecommunications, Inc., the company that created Lingo, is the principal U.S. subsidiary of Primus Telecommunications Group, Incorporated (Nasdaq:PRTL), a Fortune 1000(R) global telecommunications company with $1.3 billion in annual revenue. Headquartered in McLean, VA, and founded in 1994, the Primus Telecommunications Group, Incorporated (Primus) is among the largest international telecommunications concerns.

Primus offers voice, Internet, Voice-over-Internet protocol (VoIP), wireless, digital subscriber line (DSL), and other data services to corporate customers, small- and medium-sized businesses, residential customers, and other communications carriers located throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia, and Australia.

Primus owns and operates an extensive global network, including a VoIP "backbone" that reaches over 150 countries through 550 points-of-presence throughout the world. Primus first entered the VoIP market in 1999, and now carries more than one billion minutes of international VoIP traffic annually.

In addition to offering consumer and business VoIP services to customers outside of North America, this year Primus was the first communications company in Canada to roll out a broadband telephone service for residential customers, called TalkBroadband(TM).

For more information about Lingo, visit: http://www.lingo.com



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