TV viewing just got a whole lot smarter

TELUS launches Optik Smart Remote – spend less time surfing and control your Optik TV by tapping or swiping your mobile device

New HD channels also now available on Optik



Vancouver – Today TELUS launched the Optik Smart Remote app, an innovative way to surf TV and more using your mobile or tablet device for the ultimate in control.



Optik Smart Remote enables customers to surf through all their content choices on their phone or tablet instead of the traditional guide on the TV. You can spend less time channel surfing by using guide filters to show only what you’re looking to find. By linking your mobile device with your digital set top box, you can use swipes on your iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch to change the channel. You can track your favourite shows or see what is most popular. You can also navigate the interactive program guide on your mobile device without interrupting a moment of your show and, when you find something you want to watch, open up the show information panel and get even more program related information from sources like IMDB, Wikipedia and YouTube.



“Optik Smart Remote from TELUS is the next step in the evolution of home entertainment,” said David Fuller, TELUS Chief Marketing Officer. “There is an incredible amount of content available today and our customers have told us that browsing through all of this content on a traditional remote and TV screen can be both time consuming and frustrating. To address this, we created Optik Smart Remote which takes your Optik TV viewing to the next level as you access new ways to discover content and navigate all controls using an iPhone, an iPod Touch or an iPad – and you can do all of this without interrupting what you’re watching. Once again, Optik TV has improved, enabling a richer TV experience for our customers, all with a tap or a swipe of their fingers.”



TELUS, committed to offering our customers great value and choice, has also added 10 new HD channels to its lineup. Optik TV offers more than 550 channels, including more than 135 in HD which now include SPACE HD, Discovery Channel HD, bravo HD, Investigation Discovery HD, Discovery Science HD, Animal Planet HD, The Comedy Network HD, E! HD, BNN HD and CTV News Channel HD. Optik TV customers can get all their HD channels for no extra charge.



Optik Smart Remote is free to download. To take advantage of Optik Smart Remote, customers must subscribe to TELUS Optik TV and High Speed Internet and have an Optik TV account.



For more information on Optik Smart Remote, please visit telus.com/smartremote.





About Optik TV

Optik TV provides never before seen functionality and features as well as more than 550 channels, including more than 135 channels in High Definition (HD). Optik TV is an IPTV based service and features applications like Facebook and remote record, an application that allows subscribers to manage their PVR recordings from any Internet connection or select smartphones. One PVR is all you need to enable every digital box in your home with the ability to pause, rewind and replay live TV, schedule recordings, access existing recordings, and pause a show in one room and pick it up in another room from the same spot.



With Optik TV, TELUS customers can even use their Xbox 360 as a digital television box. TELUS is the first TV provider in the world to offer voice and gesture navigation on both live and recorded TV, via an advanced version of Optik TV for Xbox 360 which takes advantage of Xbox’s Kinect sensor. In addition, TELUS’ Optik TV subscribers can now also enjoy a new application called Optik on the go, which allows customers to view a selection of TV On Demand shows and movies on their mobile devices, tablets and laptops, at home and on the move.



About TELUS

TELUS (TSX: T, T.A; NYSE: TU) is a leading national telecommunications company in Canada, with $10.6 billion of annual revenue and 12.8 million customer connections including 7.4 million wireless subscribers, 3.5 million wireline network access lines, 1.3 million Internet subscribers and 595,000 TELUS TV customers. Led since 2000 by President and CEO, Darren Entwistle, TELUS provides a wide range of communications products and services including wireless, data, Internet protocol (IP), voice, television, entertainment and video.



In support of our philosophy to give where we live, TELUS, our team members and retirees have contributed more than $260 million to charitable and not-for-profit organizations and volunteered 4.2 million hours of service to local communities since 2000. Fourteen TELUS Community Boards lead TELUS’ local philanthropic initiatives. TELUS was honoured to be named the most outstanding philanthropic corporation globally for 2010 by the Association of Fundraising Professionals, becoming the first Canadian company to receive this prestigious international recognition