Agilent Technologies Firehunter/e-Commerce Offers First Continuous Real-Time Monitoring of E-Commerce Site Performance.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 2, 2000

ISP Hosts of E-Commerce Sites and Business Managers Can Now Verify

Service Levels and Business Performance

Agilent Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:A) today introduces the first solution that allows Internet Service Providers (ISPs) hosting electronic business-to-consumer storefronts to continuously monitor performance of the entire infrastructure that supports e-commerce.

Agilent Firehunter/e-Commerce monitoring includes synthetic transactions that repeatedly test both the user's experience with the commerce application and component operations managed by institutions that host ISPs do not control; for example, catalog look-up, credit verification and debiting and ordering. Firehunter/e-Commerce also enables Web-business managers to obtain independent corroboration of real-time performance in business terms -- approved sales rates in dollars per minute, payment service errors, item sold rate -- with normal performance baselines and alerting thresholds.

Firehunter/e-Commerce provides comprehensive measurements that allow ISPs to make verifiable business-oriented service level assurance (SLA) agreements with e-commerce vendors. The software can track real-time SLA compliance, identify potential problems anywhere within the infrastructure, alert the appropriate people and systems, and trigger other applications to correct problems. Firehunter/e-Commerce couples real-time transaction monitoring with the ability to "drill-down" and isolate the root causes of problems. Firehunter/e-Commerce combines these end-user-experience and infrastructure-performance views with near-real-time business performance measurements to provide a complete picture of e-commerce service health. The solution's measurements also enable ISPs to negotiate realistic SLAs with co-service providers and use these to provide end-to-end service guarantees to their business customers.

"Consumer patience with delay on e-commerce sites can be measured in seconds," said Tom White, vice president and general manager of Agilent's Communications Solutions Group. "Many things can go wrong. Firehunter/e-Commerce allows ISPs to locate and fix infrastructure problems quickly. ISPs can now offer SLAs that differentiate them from competitors, and they can demand the same high-quality service from others. We believe that this solution can dramatically improve the efficiency of e-commerce across the service chain."

On-going Business Data for Web Business Managers

Firehunter/e-Commerce also provides Web business managers with ongoing measurements of business performance. Managers can use the system to establish norms for types of activities at specific times of a day -- for example, typical income or how many items are sold per minute between noon and 1:00 p.m. on Tuesday -- and then compare current performance against these baselines and evaluate trends.

"We need continuous and comprehensive information about our customers' experience at hpshopping.com," said Mike Bridge, chief technology officer at hpshopping.com, Hewlett-Packard Company's business-to-consumer e-commerce subsidiary. "Slowdowns or outages can cost tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars a minute. Firehunter/e-Commerce can quickly alert us to problems that other monitors miss, and provides the ongoing business data necessary to sustain our number one ranking in retail e-commerce revenue."

Automated, Non-intrusive Sampling

Firehunter/e-Commerce monitors performance through automated sampling. The solution records all of the steps that customers take when interacting with an e-commerce application and uses these "synthetic transactions" to test performance. Whenever a step slows down beyond a specified threshold, Firehunter issues an alarm and identifies the problem. Test frequency can be adjusted to keep information current without generating unnecessary traffic."

Firehunter/e-Commerce will also notify other applications that correct problems before they escalate, such as Hewlett-Packard's WebQoS, which employs admission-control and load-redirection technologies to prevent Web sites from being overwhelmed at peak hours.

Firehunter/e-Commerce will debut at the 2000 BroadVision International User Conference, May 21 to 24 and ASPCON Spring 2000, May 24 in Orlando, Fla.

U.S. Pricing and Availability

Agilent Firehunter/e-Commerce is available now. Pricing starts at $20,000. For more information, visit the Web at www.firehunter.com.

About Agilent Technologies

Agilent Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:A) is a diversified technology company, resulting from Hewlett-Packard Company's plan to strategically realign itself into two fully independent companies. With 42,000 employees serving customers in more than 120 countries, Agilent Technologies is a global leader in designing and manufacturing test, measurement and monitoring instruments, systems and solutions, and semiconductor and optical components. The company serves markets that include communications, electronics, life sciences and healthcare. The businesses comprising Agilent, a subsidiary of HP, had net revenues of more than $8.3 billion in fiscal year 1999.

Information about Agilent Technologies can be found on the Web at www.agilent.com.

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