Hitachi to Bundle Award-Winning BeatWare Mail-It with New FLORA Prius 330J PCs.

MENLO PARK, Calif., Jan. 19 /PRNewswire/ -- BeatWare, Inc. and Hitachi, Ltd. today announced that BeatWare Mail-It(TM), the award-winning email application for the BeOS(R), will be bundled with Hitachi's FLORA Prius line of desktop computers.

Hitachi's FLORA Prius line of computers consists of three multi-boot desktop models, each pre-installed with the Japanese version of the BeOS(R) Release 4 and Windows(R) 98. In addition to the multi-boot environment, each computer features a Pentium(R) II 400 MHz processor, a space-saving micro- tower housing and LCD monitor.

BeatWare Mail-It is the number one selling email application on the BeOS. Designed specifically to send, receive and manage large amounts of email quickly and gracefully, Mail-It supports multiple email accounts and features high-speed message caching, sophisticated filtering for both incoming and outgoing email, and an expansive contact manager. When used in conjunction with BeOS R4.0J, Mail-It provides complete support for sending and receiving Japanese language email.

"We're very pleased that BeatWare Mail-It is an integral part of these leading edge desktop systems," said Karen Cassel, Vice President of Sales and Marketing, BeatWare, Inc. "In today's Internet era, having an email application with the horsepower to handle large numbers of messages, images and HTML is essential."

BeatWare, Inc. specializes in the design, development and marketing of essential productivity and creativity software applications for the modern Be Operating System. Additional information on BeatWare and its products is available on the company website at http://www.beatware.com, via email at [e-mail], or by calling BeatWare's Menlo Park headquarters at 650-322-7290.

Hitachi, Ltd., headquartered in Tokyo, Japan is the world's largest electronics company. Hitachi manufactures a wide range of high quality computer hardware, peripherals, and semiconductors.

Be, Inc., founded in 1990 by Jean-Louis Gassee, is a software company focusing on building new foundations for the next generation of digital content and media design tools. With a team of industry-leading engineers and business executives in the United States and Europe, the company is dedicated to removing the limitations of existing computer architectures and delivering a new level of price performance.

In July 1997, Be published the first public release of the Be Operating System (BeOS), the core product of this strategy. Additional information on Be and the BeOS is available online at http://www.be.com. Be, Inc. is headquartered in Menlo Park, California.

BeatWare Mail-It is a trademark of BeatWare, Inc. Be and BeOS are trademarks or registered trademarks of Be, Inc. Hitachi and FLORA Prius are trademarks or registered trademarks of Hitachi LTD. All other product and brand names mentioned may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.