eTrue.com Secures $4.5 Million Investment for Biometric Internet Service; Davenport Capital Ventures Leads First Round of Financing for Market Expansion

Business Wire, July 25, 2000

Business/Technology Editors

WELLESLEY, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 25, 2000

eTrue.com, (formerly Miros, Inc.) the first biometric authentication service that is outsourced over the Internet, announced today that the company has secured $4.5 million in venture funding from Davenport Capital Ventures and private investors. eTrue.com will utilize this initial round of funding to market and expand the company's leadership position in outsourced biometric-based authentication.

Using eTrue's finger and face verification, only trusted users can log on to local and remote networks as well as the Web. With biometrics, there are no passwords to remember or cards to carry; the user is the password. eTrue's managed service can have businesses up and running with the most secure user ID in a matter of days.

"eTrue provides businesses with the most secure and reliable user authentication service, managed over the Internet. This ensures that our customers' networks are only accessed by trusted users. This funding will enable us to build on our success as the lead provider of biometric authentication outsourcing services over the Internet," said Dr. Michael Kuperstein, eTrue.com's founder. "Davenport Capital Ventures brings a wealth of relationships with industry-leading vendors in e-commerce. This will enable us to create a number of strategic partnerships."

"Trusting the right users to access valuable assets is becoming increasingly important to e-commerce, especially in health care and financial markets, where privacy and security are key concerns. eTrue's new Internet-based delivery system for secure user authentication enables many e-commerce applications to come online, that otherwise would not," said Patrick Davenport, Managing General Partner of Davenport Capital Ventures. "With eTrue's outsourcing service, customers can remain focused on their own applications, while eTrue manages their user authentication needs."

eTrue's first focus will be health care and financial services, providing secure network and Web logon. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) requires hospitals and health insurers to provide audit trails to patient records using e-signatures by the year 2002. These institutions have been very receptive to eTrue providing them with a solution that gives them compliance under HIPAA.

Brokerage firms are looking to eTrue to provide them with an easy-to-use solution for customers to gain access to their accounts while maintaining their privacy. Banks view eTrue as a means to enable cash management to be brought online in a secure fashion.

About the eTrue.com Service

The eTrue.com business-to-business ASP service identifies authorized computer or network users through the power and ease of face and/or finger verification. The service is easily installed, with no capital outlay needed. The eTrue.com service easily scales to accommodate any number of users, and is available around the clock, seven days a week. Reliability is assured with secure, redundant, mirrored servers maintained by eTrue.com and its hosting partners.

Because IT management is freed of the tasks of user ID registration, verification, administration and maintenance, eTrue.com allows companies to spend more time focusing on their core business activities. Customers of the eTrue.com service receive video cameras and finger readers at no additional charge. There is only a monthly subscription fee for the service. Interested customers can now order the service.

Those wishing a free demo of eTrue's face recognition technology can download it from the eTrue.com site, at http://www.etrue.com.

About eTrue.com

Headquartered in Wellesley, MA, eTrue.com is a leading provider of personal identification biometric solutions using face recognition and fingerprint reading. Its TrueFace(TM) product is the most installed face recognition product worldwide, and is the simplest to use personal ID solution available. eTrue.com solutions are used on every continent in applications including computer security, physical access control, check-cashing ATMs, law enforcement and government fraud prevention.

About Davenport Capital Ventures

Davenport Capital Ventures of Braintree, Massachusetts, has invested in over 20 emerging growth high technology companies in the areas of optical networking, telecom, Internet and e-commerce infrastructure. Davenport Capital Ventures is affiliated with Bank Vontobel AG of Switzerland, which is a $40 billion dollar Swiss Investment Bank. Other Davenport Capital Ventures portfolio companies include Corvis Corporation, Codeon Corporation, Integrity Communications, E-Commerce Solutions, Hyperchip, VIPswitch, NetPCS, Ncom Group, Receipt City.com, CommerceTV and AdAlive.

eTrue.com and TrueFace are registered trademarks of eTrue.com in the United States and other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.