YellowOnline.com Launches 72 Internet Yellow Pages Directories in The United States

Business Wire, Sept 7, 1999

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 7, 1999--

National Launch Reaches 230 Million Consumers in U.S.

YOL.com Plans IPO in 2000

Former Pac Bell Executive Takes on Regional Bells

YellowOnline.com, one of the largest internet Yellow Pages in the country, announces the national launch of 72 online Yellow Pages directories, covering 85.7 percent of the population in the United States with 10.8 million listings.

Formed six months ago by Robert Alan Davis, a 16-year executive of the Yellow Pages industry with Pacific Bell Directory and Southern Bell Directory, YellowOnline.com specializes in publishing nationwide internet Yellow Pages and targeting products and services to a broad spectrum of businesses and consumers at the click of a mouse with the familiar display and information format of the printed Yellow Pages.

Davis has recruited former executives form Pacific Bell to launch YellowOnline.com and knows the baby Bells weaknesses.

"We're taking on the Regional Bell Operating Companies, because they do not want to cannibalize their highly profitable $13 billion print business.

We're the David against the Goliaths and we plan on winning this internet Yellow Pages battle," said Robert Davis, president and founder of YellowOnline.com.

YellowOnline.com

Davis said his business model is unique because YellowOnline.com has chosen to do what the Regional Bell Operating Companies and independent Yellow Pages publishers have resisted: To provide end-users with the familiar Yellow Pages display format with all of the advantages of the internet -- design flexibility, animation, sound, e-mail, fax, hyperlinks and fully enabled e-commerce sites linked from ads.

"In the last two months alone, we've had more than 1 million hits on our web site," Davis said.

Focusing on the small business market, which constitutes 90 percent of the $13 billion Yellow Pages industry -- including 3.7 million paid advertisers -- YellowOnline.com raised equity funds to start the company and plans an (IPO) initial public offering in 2000. The web site is (www.YOL.com).