WebCT Announces New Consortium Licensing Agreement With Over 30 Post Secondary Institutions in Ontario.

Business Editors

PEABODY, Mass. & VANCOUVER, B.C.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 5, 2000

Today's Announcement Increases Number of Provinces and States

Participating in Consortium Licensing Agreements With WebCT to 10

WebCT today announced that it has signed a province-wide site licensing agreement for over 30 post secondary institutions in Ontario, offering these institutions the option to access WebCT's course management system. The Office for Partnership for Advanced Skills (OPAS) and the Council of Ontario Universities (COU) coordinated this arrangement.

Today's announcement increases the number of provinces and states participating in consortium licensing agreements with WebCT to 10. Other consortia include Alberta and British Columbia in Canada, as well as Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, New Mexico, Ohio, the Virtual College of Texas, and West Virginia in the U.S.

"We're growing at a rapid pace, and this announcement is evidence of our broad use and commitment to the education marketplace," said Carol Vallone, President and CEO of WebCT. "We're pleased to work with post secondary institutions in Ontario to further e-learning."

"With two-thirds of post secondary institutions in Ontario using WebCT already, the choice to come together under a unified licensing agreement was clear," said Norm Shulman, Executive Director, Office for Partnerships for Advanced Skills. "Together we have the opportunity to enhance the development of e-learning."

About the COU and OPAS

The COU represents the collective interests of 17 member universities and two associate members. The member institutions include Brock University, Carleton University, University of Guelph, Lakehead University, Laurentian University, McMaster University, Nippissing University, University of Ottawa, Queen's University, Ryerson Polytechnic University, University of Toronto, Trent University, University of Waterloo, University of Western Ontario, Wilfrid Laurier University, University of Windsor, and York University. The associate members are Ontario College of Art & Design and the Royal Military College of Canada. Together, the 17 member institutions had an enrollment of 229,241 full-time and 72,859 part-time students, and 11,395 full-time and 1,803 part-time FTE faculty in 1998. All member universities are participating in the licensing agreement. OPAS is a partnership of all the universities in Ontario and a growing number of leading companies. It provides a central point of entry to the universities for purposes of providing continued learning for knowledge workers, much of this via technology-mediated learning.

In addition to the post secondary institutions represented by COU, the following are also covered by this licensing agreement: Algonquin College, Cambrian College, Conestoga College, Confederation College, Fanshawe College, George Brown College, Humber College, La Cite Collegiale, Lambton College, Loyalist College, Mohawk College, Niagara College, Sault College, Seneca College, Sheridan College, Sir Sanford Fleming College, the Limestone District School Board and two non-profit organizations, Forum for International Trade Training (FITT) Inc. and TG Magazine/The Students Commission.

About WebCT

WebCT is the leading provider of Web-based course tools, community, content, and commerce to the higher education marketplace. Today, more than 46,000 faculty are using WebCT to teach courses with over 6.6 million accounts at 1,433 colleges and universities in 55 countries. This doesn't include more than 800 K-12 schools and almost 100 corporate customers who are also using WebCT, or about 7,000 others who are currently conducting free trials.

The company's robust e-learning environment integrates WebCT, the most popular course management system in the world, the Math Forum, the leading math community on the Internet, and WebCT.com, the first destination site to offer both teaching and learning resources to a community of peers across discipline and institutional boundaries. WebCT also has a strategic alliance with SCT and Campus Pipeline to provide a unified end-to-end system that delivers a full range of online learning resources, administrative services, and campus intranet offerings from a single login.

The company has offices in Peabody, MA, and Swarthmore, PA, in the U.S., as well as Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. WebCT's largest investor is CMGI@Ventures, the venture capital affiliate of CMGI (Nasdaq: CMGI). More information about the company and its integrated e-learning environment can be found at www.webct.com.