AVT Corporation Announces Merger With MediaTel Corporation.

KIRKLAND, Wash.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 14, 1999--

Company Enters Fast-Growing Market for Outsourced Internet-Enabled

Document Delivery Services for Business-Critical Communications

Introduces New AVT-MediaLinq(TM) Electronic Delivery Service

AVT Corporation (Nasdaq:AVTC) today announced its acquisition of MediaTel Corporation, a privately held, San Francisco based provider of outsourced electronic document delivery services, through a merger of MediaTel with a wholly owned subsidiary of AVT in a tax-free, stock-for-stock transaction.

"The addition of MediaTel's services business is consistent with AVT's mission to provide our customers with one place to manage all of their enterprise communications," said Richard J. LaPorte, AVT Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. "MediaTel is an established, profitable and fast-growing provider of electronic document delivery services to corporations that are reengineering their workflow in order to take advantage of the value and benefits of electronic commerce. The applications MediaTel offers in the services sector have a direct correlation to those we are offering with our RightFAX(R) and CommercePath(TM) server lines. By uniting these lines of business we can provide our customers the best software and services solutions available in the market."

The MediaTel network, which will be marketed under the AVT-MediaLinq(TM) service brand, delivers on average over 750,000 pages of business-critical information daily in an efficient, secure and cost-effective manner over a combination of the Internet and the public switched telephone network. The company presently serves over 2,000 corporate customers, including numerous Fortune 500 companies.

"Our customers are looking for cost effective alternatives to exchanging high volumes of critical information with their commerce partners and customers. Continually adding access ports and long distance lines to handle peak load volumes is not the solution. MediaTel's unique approach to utilizing the Internet for their customer's benefit while leveraging their telecommunications suppliers to reduce transaction costs, will allow us to provide cost-effective, highly scalable solutions for our customers well into the future," added LaPorte.

MediaTel's communications network can initiate over 5,000 simultaneous connections with facsimile machines or fax servers, instantaneously delivering a large volume of documents, seven days a week, 24 hours a day. The Company maintains communication hubs in San Francisco and Washington, DC that support over 200 T1-line connections. In addition to its long-distance network, the Company's state-of-the-art TCP/IP-based communications network enables high-bandwidth connections required for the simultaneous delivery and receipt of thousands of documents in email or facsimile format over the Internet.

MediaTel offers a wide range of services to its customers. Their DocumentBroadcast and Basic-InternetDelivery services provide the delivery of a large number of documents simultaneously to recipients' fax machines, printers or Internet email addresses. DocumentMerge delivers a large number of "personalized" documents to recipients' fax machines or Internet email addresses. Certified-InternetDelivery provides delivery of sensitive documents over the internet for customers requiring "return-receipt" notification. DocumentReply receives high volumes of responses to customer's outbound documents for applications such as survey responses and membership applications. DocumentOnRequest allows customers to store a library of documents on the Company's servers which can then be accessed by callers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week by calling a toll-free 800 number. MediaLinqClient workstation software provides clients the ability to compose and manage documents, cover letters and distribution lists on their local PCs, and submit them via the Internet for distribution over the MediaTel network.

Commenting on the merger, MediaTel founder and CEO Sanjeev Malaney said: "Our decision to partner with AVT over other alternatives was based on our belief that AVT and MediaTel share common values regarding how we service and treat our customers, respect and reward our employees, and put above all else the goals of increasing shareholders' value. I look forward to working with the AVT management team in any way I can, to find new avenues of profitable growth for our combined businesses, further benefiting the interests of our shareholders."

MediaTel Corporation, which through the merger became a wholly owned subsidiary of AVT, will be known as the "MediaLinq Services Group." It will be one of AVT's four strategic business units, which also include the CTI Software Group, RightFAX Software Group and CommercePath Software Group. David Sohm, MediaTel's vice president of sales and marketing, will become the group's president, succeeding outgoing president Richard Zalisk. Sanjeev Malaney, founder and CEO of MediaTel, will continue as a consultant to AVT Corporation assisting with long range planning and business development activities. All 80 MediaTel employees will become employees of AVT Corporation, with no employee-related changes anticipated. Business operations will continue to be headquartered in San Francisco.

Under terms of the agreement, each share of MediaTel was converted into 0.125 of a share of AVT common stock. Based on the number of outstanding MediaTel shares, AVT issued approximately 1.6 million new shares to MediaTel's shareholders in the merger, which will be accounted for as a pooling of interests. In addition, AVT assumed all outstanding options to purchase MediaTel shares, which will be exercisable for approximately 300,000 AVT shares. The total transaction is valued at approximately $48 million.

Added Roger Fukai, AVT's Chief Financial Officer: "With the exception of the non-recurring charge for acquisition-related expenses expected to be recorded in the second quarter, we expect the acquisition will contribute positively to our net income, earnings per share, and cash flow this year. MediaTel is an extremely well run, highly profitable enterprise, with a solid balance sheet and, like AVT, it has no debt. AVT has long wanted to acquire a strategic, synergistic, service-based business operation that would add a significant source of recurring revenue to our growing portfolio of server-based products."

Regarding the synergy between MediaTel and other AVT business units, LaPorte added, "One of the key factors that led us to enter this market is our ability to now offer these electronic document management services to the base of over 20,000 users of our popular RightFAX and CommercePath servers. By combining our MediaLinq services with our award winning RightFAX and CommercePath line of enterprise and production fax servers, we can offer the market the most comprehensive set of document management and messaging products and services available today. Going forward, we plan to tightly integrate these products so customers can easily move between on-premise and service-based document management alternatives. One of our first tasks will be to develop a set of CommercePath integrations to our MediaLinq services, so our service customers can send and receive large volumes of commerce documents such as purchase orders, invoices, time sheets and billing statements directly to and from their host-based ERP applications. In addition, we plan to include an integrated version of the MediaLinqClient access module with our RightFAX and CommercePath software, so customers using our on-premise servers can easily submit high-volume document delivery jobs over our network. No longer will customers be forced to make a decision between contracting for document delivery services or purchasing on-premise equipment; they can now opt to purchase or lease a combination of both from AVT. Furthermore, we plan to make all of our document management products and services available through all distribution channels, including our direct sales organization and our reseller network."

Further details about AVT products and services, including the new MediaLinq offerings, can be obtained from the AVT web site at www.avtc.com.

MediaTel Corporation, established in 1989, is located in San Francisco, Calif. The company provides its more than 2,000 corporate customers with the ability to deliver high volume, business-critical information in a faster, more reliable and more cost-effective manner than could otherwise be done internally or by other means. The company maintains sales and support offices in several locations, including, Washington, D.C., Newport Beach, New York, Chicago, Miami, Pittsburgh and Tokyo, Japan.

AVT Corporation solves enterprise communication problems by providing a broad line of open systems-based software products and communications services, specializing in call processing, enterprise messaging, document management and customer service applications, marketed to organizations of all size and industry through multiple channels of distribution. AVT is headquartered in Kirkland, Wash., USA, and does business through its CTI Software Group, based in Kirkland, through its RightFAX Software Group, based in Tucson, Ariz., and through its CommercePath Software Group, based in Portland, Ore. In addition, AVT has sales and support offices in the United Kingdom, Germany, Hong Kong and Dubai. Founded in 1982, AVT is publicly traded under the symbol "AVTC" on the Nasdaq National Market. AVT maintains a site on the World Wide Web at www.avtc.com.

RightFAX is a registered trademark of AVT Corporation. MediaTel is a registered trademark of MediaTel Corporation.

This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties, including technical and competitive factors, which could cause the Company's results and the timing of certain events to differ materially from those discussed in the forward-looking statements. Such risks are detailed in AVT's latest Annual Report on Form 10-K filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

NOTE TO EDITORS: News releases are available from AVT's Newsroom fax server. Call 425/820-4089 and follow the prompts. This is document number 77111. News releases can also be found on AVT's World Wide Web site at www.avtc.com.