Akibia, Inc. Formed as Total eCRM Solutions Provider.

Business/Technology Editors

MARLBOROUGH and BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 19, 2000

Polaris Service and Polaris Solutions Merge to Capitalize on 

Explosive Demand for Complete Systems Integration, Application and

Infrastructure Management Services

Polaris Service, the leader in infrastructure reliability services, and Boston-based Polaris Solutions, the leader in internet-enabled customer relationship management (eCRM) consulting, announced today that they have combined to form Akibia, Inc. Akibia will provide total eCRM solutions -- from initial implementation to ongoing consulting, support, hosting and maintenance.

Akibia is uniquely positioned to capitalize on the widespread adoption of eCRM applications and the growing attractiveness of the application service provider (ASP) model. According to investment bank Deutsche Banc Alex. Brown, the CRM market is expected to surpass the ERP market and become the top strategic IT investment for the next three to five years. On the future of ASPs, GartnerGroup says, "the worldwide market for outsourced application services is forecasted to grow to more than $22.7 billion, representing an annual growth of 91 percent."

"The most successful eCRM solutions are delivered rapidly and are uniquely tailored to the business model of the client," said Tom Willson, CEO of Akibia. "And a process must be in place to maintain and support both the system and the people who use it. Akibia is unmatched in its ability to deliver tailored eCRM applications designed to meet the specific needs of customers, along with the peace of mind knowing that Akibia will support them and the application every step of the way."

Akibia has developed the RightNow(SM) approach to ensure that an eCRM solution fits the specific business needs of the customer while still being delivered at an accelerated pace. The RightNow approach has been used to create a Siebel-based eCRM solution delivered to more than 20 customers in an average time of six weeks per customer. To date, the fastest RightNow solution was delivered in three weeks to Akamai Technologies. Other customers include Citibank, Monster.com, Parametric Technology, Threadneedle and Bose Corporation. Akibia is consistently rated one of Siebel Systems' highest quality partners.

"Pound for pound, Akibia teams have up to five times the eCRM experience as our competitors," said Adam Honig, president of Akibia's application consulting business. "Unlike most of our competition, we focus exclusively on the eCRM space and have developed deep domain experience which translates into faster implementations that improve our customers' bottom line performance. Because of our `No Jerks' hiring philosophy, our consultants work better with our customers' organizations."

"With our Siebel eCRM implementation, speed was of the essence," said Irwin Weiss, chief information officer at Akamai Technologies. "This is an environment that demands our systems keep pace with our rapidly expanding business. We chose to work with Akibia because of their ability to meet our time commitments and because they had the expertise we needed to design, implement and support every facet of the application. Akibia took ownership in supporting our business and got our solution off the ground in record time."

To maintain and support an eCRM solution and related infrastructure, Akibia has created a series of offerings called flexHosting(SM). flexHosting allows customers to choose the level of support they need in any given area. These areas include application, operating system and hardware support, hosting, remote and on-site end-user support, systems and application administration and training. Polaris Service pioneered this concept and, today, Akibia provides system and application level flexHosting to more than 200 customers including Goldman Sachs, Cisco Systems, Incentive Systems and America Online.

"Akibia supports over 110,000 flexHosting seats, managed by our call centers in Massachusetts, California and the Netherlands, and by our engineering staff located at our facilities and customer sites worldwide," said Karl Laubscher, president of Akibia's flexHosting business. "For the past ten years, customers have entrusted us with their mission-critical systems and data. Our nearly 100 percent renewal rate is a testament to the quality of our service and to the value we bring to our customers."

About Akibia

Akibia is an expert provider of total eCRM solutions for high-growth technology and financial services corporations worldwide. The company designs, implements and hosts eCRM applications and infrastructure that enhance business relationships and deliver competitive advantage. Akibia was formed in 2000 and is headquartered in Marlborough, Massachusetts with US offices in Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Fremont (CA), and New York, and international offices in London and the Netherlands. The company employs more than 375 multi-talented people worldwide. Customers include Akamai Technologies, Inc., New York Stock Exchange, Citibank, Monster.com, Goldman Sachs, Cisco and Parametric Technologies. For more information call 508-460-1800 or visit the Akibia web site at www.akibia.com.