BellSouth Ranked Number One ISP by Business Customers.

ATLANTA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 13, 1999--

National Survey Reveals BellSouth Business Customer

Satisfaction Higher Than All Major ISPs

BellSouth garnered the highest level of satisfied customers of any major regional or national ISP in a survey of business Internet service provider (ISP) customers released today. The survey, conducted for Inter@ctive Week by Survey.com, asked the magazine's subscribers to rank the importance of various attributes, then queried the level of satisfaction regarding these attributes for their companies' primary ISP. In the overall ISP rankings, BellSouth Business Internet Services delivered by BellSouth.net led the field over all other industry providers, including UUNet, IBM Global Network, MindSpring and AT&T WorldNet.

In addition to placing number one in the overall rankings, BellSouth scored big in several specific categories, including customers' top two criteria: percentage of uptime and network performance. BellSouth's leadership was evident, scoring among the top five in almost every category, indicating a solid performance across the board.

"At the end of the day, the real test for any ISP is the satisfaction of its customers," said Cindy Hamrin, BellSouth marketing vice president. "The results of the Inter@ctive Week survey confirm that we are living up to our promise to customers to deliver world-class, reliable Internet performance across a broad and deep portfolio of services. We will continue to demand the highest standards of excellence of ourselves and in our services. Businesses expect high-quality service and BellSouth is prepared to meet the challenge."

According to Hamrin, BellSouth has made a concerted effort to ensure that a reliable infrastructure is in place to deliver consistent and dependable business Internet services, including technology, systems, people and services. BellSouth has pursued an aggressive Internet development strategy focused on key objectives, including:

--   actively engaging customers to better understand requirements and
     expectations;

--   strengthening front-line service delivery personnel with the
     technical training needed to satisfy customers focused on
     business;

--   continually upgrading the company's IP network and network nodes
     for higher grades of business Internet service; and

--   enhancing systems support, web-based performance reporting, and
     other customer-centric support capabilities.

In addition to satisfying customers, BellSouth is satisfying analysts such as Current Analysis and Gartner Group. The Gartner Group recently recognized BellSouth Business Internet Services as one of a number of key ISPs that will "best meet enterprises' needs during the next five years." (Gartner Research Note, Sept. 30, 1999)

In the Inter@ctive Week article reporting the survey results, Hillary Mine of Probe Research said BellSouth, "...took it very seriously several years go when they started having real competition for the first time, and they learned lessons from PacBell, Bell Atlantic and Ameritech, who got competition first. They also have very smart management and, as one of the earliest and biggest investors in wireless data networking, they got a lot of experience in very challenging data networking, in ways that other Bell companies have not."

BellSouth Business Internet Services delivers the world-class security, reliability and customer service that companies have come to expect from one of the nation's top-rated Internet service providers. BellSouth has demonstrated a consistent track record of Internet performance, earning multiple A+ ratings from April through October 1999 by Inverse Network Technology, a leading independent firm that measures the performance and reliability of large ISPs nationwide. These distinctions, along with redundant Internet backbone links, 24x7 proactive monitoring and management, low user-to-modem ratios and dedicated connections, place BellSouth's Internet infrastructure second to none.

To obtain the full Inter@ctive Week survey results and analysis, visit www.intweek.com/stories/news/0,4164,2405959,00.html. For more information on Internet services and other innovative business offers from BellSouth, companies should contact their account representative, or visit BellSouth's web site at www.biz.bellsouth.net.

BellSouth is a $25 billion communications services company. It provides telecommunications, wireless communications, cable and digital TV, advertising and publishing, and Internet and data services to nearly 36 million customers in 19 countries worldwide. BellSouth's Web site is located at http://www.bellsouth.com.

BellSouth Business is a trade name of BellSouth Intellectual Property Corporation licensed to and used to collectively identify BellSouth Business Systems, Inc., BellSouth Communication Systems, Inc. and BellSouth MNS, Inc.