White Pine Marks Milestone in H.323 Conferencing With Continuous Presence and Streaming Media Integration; MeetingPoint 4.0 Ships to Bring Wide Spectrum of Business Benefits.

NASHUA, N.H.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 6, 1999--

White Pine Software, Inc. (NASDAQ: WPNE), a leading provider of multimedia conferencing applications for the Internet and intranets, today announced its MeetingPoint(TM) server version 4.0 for enhanced IP-based videoconferencing and group collaboration.

The newest version of MeetingPoint includes ground-breaking technology which changes the face of communication over corporate networks and the Internet. In addition to core optimizations, MeetingPoint 4.0 includes add-on components for specialized functions. These include continuous presence, the ability to view multiple video windows simultaneously, and streaming media integration, features that have not previously been available for standards-based conferencing over the Internet or an IP network. Both enhance the conferencing experience for end-users and extend the potential reach of live, face-to-face communication exponentially. Version 4.0 of MeetingPoint also includes full integration of the Labtam T.120 technology that White Pine purchased last year. This integration improves the performance and scalability for data collaboration across networks.

"This version of MeetingPoint marks a milestone in H.323 conferencing," said Roger Wallman, senior product manager for core technologies at White Pine. "We've gone beyond basic audio, video and data sharing functionality and created an environment which allows people to communicate effectively from different locations on a network and to customize their conferencing experience based on specific needs. By making these add-on options available, MeetingPoint is the first multimedia conference server to provide a full range of solutions that can meet almost any group conferencing or collaboration need."

The continuous presence option for MeetingPoint enables the server to combine four streams of video into one split-screen image that is delivered to participating client endpoints. Standard H.323 endpoints such as Microsoft NetMeeting and Intel Proshare, which have previously been limited to showing a single incoming video window, can now show multiple video windows. MeetingPoint with continuous presence allows the end user a more user-friendly and intuitive conference experience than traditional video switching. If there are more than four participants in a conference, the end user will see the last four participants who have spoken.

"The ability to have continuous presence is extremely important in the conferencing environments we're installing," said Vincent Mosera, lead engineer at Mitre Corp. in Eatontown, NJ. "MeetingPoint 4.0 delivers superior performance in a software-based H.323 implementation, which is advantageous from the standpoint of our network topology, and it makes it easy for the end user to establish and participate in a conference."

With the option for integration of streaming media, MeetingPoint is able to broadcast a live interactive conference to hundreds or even thousands of people using a streaming media server and player such as the Microsoft(R) NetShow(TM) Server and a Windows Media Player. Conferences can be broadcast live, or recorded and played back on demand. Because the Windows Media Player is widely available as a free applet, it extends the possibilities for conferencing and communication to a much wider audience. This combination of technologies, with both an interactive group of participants and a viewing group of participants, lends itself to a number of corporate and Internet scenarios.

"With products such as White Pine's MeetingPoint 4.0, corporations can take advantage of running their H.323 videoconferencing applications over packet-switched networks," said Greg Naderi, IT market analyst at Frost & Sullivan. "Also, by leveraging version 2 of H.323, MeetingPoint 4.0 will be able to offer "fast start" and supplementary services such as call hold, call retrieve, and call transfer. Optimized multi-media, multi-party communication applications are the ingredients that will drive enterprise adoption of desktop videoconferencing. White Pine understands these elements and has developed an efficient software-based business conferencing solution around this environment."

MeetingPoint 4.0 also includes full integration of the T.120 server technology that White Pine acquired from Labtam Communications last year. White Pine's T.120 acquisition has brought core intellectual property and technology assets in-house and allowed for tighter integration of data collaboration within MeetingPoint. The new T.120 integration provides better performance, particularly in environments where multiple MeetingPoint servers are linked or cascaded within the network. The resulting benefit to end users is the ability to share documents and work collaboratively from different physical locations.

Within the core MeetingPoint product, enhancements include H.323 version 2 support, a new conference call-out capability, optimized audio and video performance, and compatibility with newly released H.323 clients including Microsoft NetMeeting(TM) version 3.0 and the Polycom ViewStation(TM). The H.323 protocol is the standard that defines IP-based conferencing. MeetingPoint now supports version 2 of H.323, which primarily deals with issues relating to Voice over IP (VoIP). The new call-out feature enables the MeetingPoint server to initiate a conference at the scheduled time by dynamically calling all of the conference participants. Previously, participants would enter a conference by initiating the connection to the MeetingPoint server from the client endpoint. The callout feature also enables participants in an existing conference to dial another endpoint on the fly to bring a colleague into the meeting.

Pricing and Availability

MeetingPoint version 4.0 is available immediately for the Windows NT and Sun Solaris operating systems. A Linux version of MeetingPoint will be available later in the year. The MeetingPoint server is affordably priced, ranging from $8,995 for a 10-user server to $15,995 for a 25-user server. The continuous presence and streaming options are $4,995 each.

About White Pine Software

White Pine Software develops, markets and supports multi-platform browser-based internetworking software that facilitates worldwide video and audio communication and data collaboration across the Internet, intranets, extranets and other networks that use the Internet Protocol. White Pine's videoconferencing software productets. White Pine's ClassPoint(TM) provides a complete solution for corporate training and distance learning. White Pine Software can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.wpine.com.

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