Clarent Corporation Sets Pace For Internet Telephony; Silicon Valley Company Revolutionizes Voice Over IP, Enhances Sound Quality, Saves Money.

BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 22, 1997--Clarent Corporation today announced its entry into the Internet telephony market as "the clear voice of the Internet."

Founded in July 1996 by Jerry Chang and Mike Vargo, Clarent provides comprehensive, scaleable system solutions that marry traditional public phone networks with the Internet to bring customers unprecedented voice quality and sophisticated telephony management and administration tools. Clarent provides the capabilities businesses need to use the Internet as their primary telecommunications network -- enabling them to benefit from the substantial cost savings promised by Internet telephony TODAY.

"Until recently, telecommunications companies, Internet Service Providers and enterprises were unable to gain the benefits of adding real-time voice conversations to their IP networks," said Jerry Chang, chief executive officer and co-founder of Clarent Corporation. "Clarent has changed this. Our Internet telephony products provide these customers with the benefits of reliable, crystal-clear, real-time voice calls while at the same time offering them the scaleability and management architecture they need to run their businesses."

"The tremendous growth of the Internet has taken us all by surprise, and we believe the same potential exists for Internet telephony," said Ken Landoline, Area Director with Giga Information Group of Cambridge, Massachusetts. "As the industry's first provider of a comprehensive solution that offers features important to customers today, Clarent is well positioned to be a leader in the Internet telephony market."

Clarent products will change the way business is conducted over traditional phone networks by providing a new revenue source for telecommunications companies and Internet Service Providers (ISPs), while offering significant cost reductions for companies whose long-distance calling makes up a large percentage of their operations costs. A customer who is deploying Clarent's products is Poptel DV GmbH i.G., the first Internet telephony service provider in Germany. Based in Berlin, Poptel will be launching an Internet telephony service in October, allowing customers to place a telephone call to any destination worldwide using the Internet.

"Clarent offers the most robust, high quality Internet telephony gateways in the industry today," said Adrian Johnson, Director, Poptel. "By basing our service on Clarent's products, we will be able to provide our users with low cost international calling rates without requiring them to have special equipment or a PC. They simply use an ordinary telephone, and the voice quality is as good as calls made over the traditional telecommunications network."

Formerly known as NetiPhone, Clarent is a privately held corporation whose management has extensive experience in telecommunications, IP telephony, networking, e-mail, voice processing, voice mail and database technologies. Clarent products have been shipping commercially since March 1997, and the company will introduce new features in Fall 1997.

"Clarent is entering the Internet telephony market at exactly the right time, as that market is beginning to explode," said Jeff Pulver, industry analyst and president/chief executive officer of pulver.com. "Clarent is tuned in to what is needed to make Internet telephony ready for business and will introduce very competitive products to the market."

About Internet Telephony

While Internet telephony is a relatively new technology -- available commercially only since 1995 -- it has grown exponentially to become one of the Internet's fastest growing sectors. According to a recent Frost & Sullivan study, Internet telephony represented a $19.8 million market in 1996 and is predicted to expand to a $1.89 billion market by the end of 2001. Additionally, an International Data Corporation study forecasts the number of long-distance minutes carried over Internet telephony networks will grow to 12.5 billion by the year 2001.

The predicted growth in the Internet telephony market and usage is attributed to a number of reasons:

-- Financial benefits to users in toll-bypass of toll-reduced long distance calls

-- Improvement in product quality (speed, clarity, reliability)

-- Growth of intranets/the Internet

-- Integration of voice and data networks into a single network

-- Increased interoperability of Internet telephony technology, including creation of the Voice over IP standards body and adoption of the H323 standard

Clarent is poised to take advantage of the Internet telephony market opportunities and to claim a leadership position in this market. -0-

Note to Editors: Clarent is a registered trademark of Clarent Corporation or its subsidiaries. All other company or product names mentioned may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.

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