CopperCom Highlights Final Phase of Web-Based Market Education Campaign for Voice Over DSL; Features '99.999% Reliable' System Requirement.

SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 11,1999--

CopperCom(TM), a Silicon Valley company that is Giving Voice to DSL(TM), today featured the final system requirement for voice over DSL in its Web-based market education campaign at www.coppercom.com.

99.999% reliability is mandatory for voice over DSL systems according to more than 60 service providers interviewed by CopperCom about system requirements for this new technology. Industry analysts agree with this conclusion.

"Both incumbent and competitive telecommunications service providers insist that equipment for deploying voice over DSL have the same 99.999% reliability as the other carrier-class equipment in their infrastructure," said Jennifer Stagnaro, CopperCom's vice president of marketing.

"Information on our Web site about this key system requirement completes the current The Many Voices of DSL(TM) education program. However, we will continue to emphasize market education on our Web site as well as in many other places, including sponsoring a full-day ADSL Forum workshop on voice over DSL in Vienna, Austria, on May 24."

CopperCom's Web-based education campaign revolves around the five system requirements for voice over DSL that were identified in discussions with service providers -- True Telephony(TM), Seamless Integration, Flexible and Efficient, Easy to Provision and Manage, 99.999% Reliability.

The education program recently explained the first four of these system requirements and is currently focusing on the final one.

99.999% Reliable

The reliability and robustness of current solutions for local telephony set very high expectations for voice services delivered over DSL. Reliability guidelines for telephony systems state that a system must have no single points of failure that affect more than 64 calls. System availability should exceed "five nines" (99.999%), which is equivalent to less than six minutes of unscheduled downtime a year.

For voice over DSL to be accepted, it must achieve these same high standards by being fully redundant and by providing NEBs-compliant (Network Equipment Building Standards) telco reliability every step of the way. There must be protection-switching features that guarantee a call will never be lost. If any piece of hardware fails, the call must be instantly rerouted.

An additional requirement is that any card or subsystem, whether failed or operational, should be able to be replaced while voice services are ongoing. This hot-swappability guarantees that technicians can replace line cards without bringing down the system and without the loss of any existing calls.

About CopperCom

CopperCom is paving the way for the next generation of high-bandwidth applications. The company designs, develops, and markets a new class of DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) products and technology that let phone companies deliver high-speed data and multiple telephone lines simultaneously over a single, conventional copper wire pair.

To date, DSL products have delivered miraculously fast data services, including Internet access and telecommuter access, over the existing telephone infrastructure.

But DSL has yet to show its ability to deliver local telephony access simultaneously with high-speed data access. In addition, for Complete DSL to make sense, it must provide this voice support without requiring any change-out of existing equipment or network management systems.

CopperCom is a privately held Silicon Valley company that is Giving Voice to DSL. The company was founded to address a worldwide market that is at the crossroads of voice and data convergence. It recently was one of ten companies chosen as 'Most Likely to Succeed' at the Network Outlook '99 conference hosted by Technologic Partners.

CopperCom was selected for the "Investors' Choice" honor from among 87 privately financed technology companies that presented their business plans to an audience of several hundred venture capitalists, money managers, investment bankers, and industry executives.

CopperCom has built a strong management team with expertise across both the data and voice networking industries, international depth in Europe, Asia and North America markets, and management experience in start-ups as well as large multinationals.

The company has attracted engineering talent from AT&T, Ericcson, Northern Telecom, Ascend, Ipsilon, Fore, Advanced Micro Devices, Network Equipment Technologies, Bay Networks and Madge Networks. CopperCom can be contacted via telephone at 408/567-9277, fax at 408/567-9558, and the Internet at www.coppercom.com.

Note to Editors: CopperCom, Giving Voice to DSL, The Many Voices of DSL, and True Telephony are trademarks of CopperCom Inc. Other trademarks appearing in this document are the property of their respective owners.