Rocky Mountain Internet Acquires Leading-Edge Electronic Commerce Software Company; Company Expands RMI's Expertise in E-commerce Solutions With e-SELL Technology

Business Wire, July 1, 1998

DENVER--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 1, 1998--Rocky Mountain Internet Inc. (NASDAQ SmallCap Market:RMII, RMIIW) announced today that it has acquired Application Methods Inc. a software development and consulting firm specializing in custom database-driven Internet, intranet and extranet software solutions.

Application Methods (http://appmethods.com), founded in 1986, provides high-level development and consulting services to companies like Netscape Communications Corporation, NetObjects Inc., SmithKline Beecham and Ernst & Young. The company recently developed, what has become its flagship product, e-SELL(R).

e-SELL is an Internet Store/Catalog software package that enables small to medium-sized businesses to sell their products all over the world -- 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The product targets merchants rather than developers by enabling complete browser-based store administration.

In addition, its fast implementation among database-driven packages allows online stores to be up and running in hours.

As an extension to Microsoft Windows NT and BackOffice, it is as scalable as Microsoft technology allows, supports industry-standards, can be customized and will integrate with almost any existing database.

Forrester Research predicts that one-third of the nation's businesses will be connected to the Internet by the year 2000. The value of business-to-business e-commerce is expected to grow to over 100 times the value of transactions executed last year online. IDC estimates the total value of Internet transactions to grow to $220 billion worldwide by the year 2000.

"The integration of e-SELL and Infohiway, our recently-acquired search engine technology, will enable RMI's customers to quickly establish and maintain a worldwide online shopping outlet backed with the marketing muscle of a unique search engine," stated Doug Hanson, chairman and CEO of RMI.

Under the terms of the agreement, RMI will acquire the Seattle-based company in a $5 million transaction of which $2.5 million in company stock will be paid up front, and the remaining sum will be disbursed over the next three years.

Application Methods' founder Ron Stevenson will join the RMI management team as President of Application Methods Inc. The company will continue to operate in Seattle and function as a wholly-owned subsidiary of RMI. Mr. Hanson will become the CEO.

Ron Stevenson, President of Application Methods, Inc. stated "We believe in Doug's vision of building a complete nationwide Internet solutions company, and we are excited to be such an important element in achieving that result."

About Rocky Mountain Internet

Rocky Mountain Internet (http://www.rmi.net) is a full-service, national telecommunications company providing Internet access, high-speed Internet access through wireless cable technology, Web development and hosting, network management, system integration, co-location services, local phone service and IP Telephony long distance to clients throughout the United States.

The company's frame-relay backbone is one of the only Colorado-based Internet networks utilizing the industry-leading Cascade switching technology, with broadband B-STDX 9000 switches strategically placed throughout Denver, Boulder and Colorado Springs to provide full network redundancy.

An acquisition of Internet Communications Corp. is pending; completion of this merger is set for September 1998. In addition, RMI recently purchased Infohiway (www.infohiway.com), a cutting-edge search engine.

RMI maintains strategic partnerships with such companies as American Telecasting Inc. (wireless cable), Frontier Corp. (long distance services), PSINet (Internet services), Vienna Systems (IP Telephony) and WinStar PacNet.

e-SELL(R) FACT SHEET

"Behind-the-scenes" technical fine points of e-SELL and the technology used to create it.

Database-Driven Content.

e-SELL is a true database-driven store/catalog product. This means that the content a shopper sees comes from a database. Web pages in e-SELL are dynamically created as a shopper makes a request.

For example, if a shopper asks to view a particular category of products, the web page containing those products, their descriptions and photos is instantly built by retrieving the elements from a database.

If a merchant wishes to add, change or delete product information that shoppers see, they simply change the contents of the database using the Store Manager interface provided by e-SELL.

This is in contrast to static web sites or stores produced by ad agencies or Web designers. In those cases, if a merchant wishes to make changes to their site, he or she must re-employ their agency or designer to modify the HTML content.

Active Server Pages (ASP).

The technology used to create e-SELL is Microsoft Active Server Pages. This new platform enables dynamic content and database-driven Web pages. It is designed primarily to run on Microsoft's Internet Information Server (IIS), although at least one third-party vendor has produced an ASP emulator, enabling ASP applications to run on servers other than Microsoft's.