Adero selects apogee networks to Provide internet billing/revenue settlement solution; NetCountant Settlement Platform to Process Billions of Content Bridge Transactions Daily.

Business/Technology Editors

SADDLE BROOK, NJ--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 6, 2000

Adero, a leading provider of network services and enabling technologies, has selected Apogee Networks' NetCountant Settlement(TM) as the foundation for its revenue sharing system for content distribution across the Internet. NetCountant Settlement will provide the rating, revenue sharing, and billing functionality which is included in the suite of services that Adero will be delivering to Content Bridge(sm) alliance partners as recently announced (see www.adero.com or www.content-bridge.com).

Adero will ensure that content is updated across all alliance member networks and provide a centralized billing and revenue sharing service for cross-network transactions. After an extensive review of Apogee Networks' capabilities, Adero has selected Apogee Networks' NetCountant Settlement platform as its settlement/billing engine.

NetCountant Settlement brings several competitive advantages to Adero's services. Its ability to scale to handle the daily content transactions load provides the required technological capability for a cross-network revenue sharing solution for the Internet. NetCountant Settlement's ability to define, identify, measure and rate content by multiple criteria, provides Adero the flexibility to develop creative new Business and Revenue models. NetCountant Settlement's real-time rating capability provides the ability to react to market changes quickly and introduce new service offerings.

"Adero and its alliance partners have embarked upon a bold new venture that we believe will have a long term and positive impact on the Internet economy. Our NetCountant Settlement platform will provide Adero with a technological advantage that will allow it to build and rapidly introduce new Revenue models for its partners and customers," said Apogee Networks' Founder and CEO Pablo Tapia.

"We concluded that the Apogee Networks' NetCountant Settlement platform has the scalability, flexibility, and complete accounting process to handle the complexity of our new suite of services," said Adero's CEO, Jonathan Crane. "NetCountant Settlement gives Adero the foundation and the flexibility needed to handle the complex content billing and revenue sharing requirements that our service offerings are providing to Content Bridge," Crane added.

"The performance and scalability that NetCountant Settlement has demonstrated opens up exciting opportunities for the industry," said Craig Norris, Analyst & Senior Editor, of Progressive Strategies, Inc. "NetCountant Settlement was tested and evaluated by Progressive Strategies to determine its flexibility, scalability and real-time rating capabilities." Norris added, "We were not only impressed with the performance of the platform, but also the elegance of the architecture, its flexibility to define and implement new content services rapidly, and its interoperability across Solaris, NT, and Linux as well as its overall fault tolerance."

"Content has different value to different market segments. Thus, the ability to define, identify and bill for actual content usage will become a fundamental competitive requirement in next generation billing platforms," said Paul Hughes, Director of Billing Practices at The Yankee Group. "Until NetCountant Settlement's development, the industry has lacked the technological capability to scale to handle the billions of content transactions that are exchanged through the Internet. Traditional legacy systems have simply been unable to scale to meet this challenge. The introduction of Apogee Networks' NetCountant Settlement, therefore, represents a significant movement towards the realization of content based billing for next generation IP services," added Hughes.

About Adero

Adero provides global services that enable companies to create a rapid, consistent and reliable Internet experience for online customers globally. These services are designed to be cost-effective, outsourced solutions for e-businesses of any size, enabling rapid deployment of Web content, distributed applications and e-commerce services worldwide. Adero is one of three founding members, along with Inktomi Corp. and America Online, Inc., of the Content Bridge alliance, which is comprised of leading global network access providers, backbone and Web hosting providers, systems integrators, and leading technology providers who collectively sell and deliver content distribution services to their customers. Adero provides core services to Content Bridge such as content management and distribution, performance monitoring, and revenue sharing and billing. Content Bridge is a service mark of Inktomi Corp. used under license by Inktomi Corp.

About Apogee Networks

Headquartered in Saddle Brook, New Jersey, Apogee Networks, Inc. is the recognized leader in developing and deploying advanced IP Content Rating/Settlement and IP Billing solutions for IP Content Distributors, ASPs, ISPs, Carriers, Wireless Internet Providers and Enterprise customers. Apogee Networks' NetCountant product line provides full end-to-end content, revenue settlement and IP billing capabilities. Uniquely, NetCountant Billing provides real-time billing, flexible service creation and high scalability to meet the challenges of rapid customer growth. Apogee Networks' NetCountant Content Collection and NetCountant Settlement platforms provide advanced IP Content aggregation, processing, and revenue settlement capabilities for Content Distributors. NetCountant Accountability provides Global 2000 Enterprise and IP Network customers with the capability to better manage and allocate IP usage thereby realizing significant bandwidth cost savings. NetCountant Performance provides Global IP Networks with advanced measurement and diagnostic capabilities that increase overall network performance. The company's product recently was awarded Networld+Interop's Best-of-Show Award. Apogee Networks is a Charter member of the Internet Protocol Detail Record (IPDR) Association.

Apogee Networks investors include Fidelity Ventures Limited, Granite Ventures (formerly H&Q Venture Associates), Oak Investment Partners, INTEL, BBVA, NetOne Systems Co., Ltd., CTC, and several private investors. For additional information about Apogee Networks, please call 1-888-APOGEE3 (276-4333) or 1-201-368-8800 or email [e-mail] or visit us at http://www.apogeenetworks.com.