Gillette Global Network Enters ASP Market; Acquires IT Partners; Enters ASP Market To Provide a Wide Array of Internet-Based Applications and Services to Customers

Business Wire, June 27, 2000

Business & High-Tech Editors

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 27, 2000

Gillette Global Network, Inc., a New York-based building-centric telecommunications provider, announced today that it has acquired IT Partners LLC of New York, N.Y., an innovative Applications Service Provider (ASP).

With this acquisition, Gillette Global Network becomes the only building-centric telecommunications provider to offer voice, data, Internet and ASP services from a single integrated source.

The acquisition of IT Partners with its experienced management team will enable Gillette Global Network to provide a full range of integrated Internet-based ASP services - e.g. hosted Microsoft exchange, managed PoP/SMTP mail, outsourced firewall and security monitoring, virus protection and Virtual Private Network (VPN) capabilities. These value added services, as well as the traditional voice, data and high speed Internet services, will be delivered over the broadband, fiber optic telecommunications infrastructure Gillette Global Network installs in its lit buildings.

"The value of this development to our customers is very significant," said Joseph P. Gillette, President and CEO, Gillette Global Network. "Through our acquisition of IT Partners, we now offer our clients a whole range of products and services integrated with the virtually unlimited bandwidth we've been delivering to their offices. Virus scanning, hosted exchange and security options all outsourced to us and managed by our professional staff, multiplies the value of that bandwidth."

"The combination also brings enormous value to our property owner partners," explained Neil Brenner, former President of IT Partners, now Senior Vice President of ASP Services for Gillette Global Network. "We can now offer a whole array of cost effective services to tenants. Instead of spending $15,000 on an Exchange Server that needs to be replaced every three years, a tenant can have full-featured e-mail for every employee in the lit building for a modest monthly fee. And, since we manage everything, all the services can be turned on the day the tenant moves in. It is a complete turn-key communications solution."

About Gillette Global Network, Inc.

Headquartered in New York, Gillette Global Network was founded in 1994 and is a facility-based integrated communications provider offering a complete array of voice and data services. Gillette Global Network is one of the leading building-centric communications (BLEC) providers in the New York area. The Company's Lit Building Program brings secure, high speed Internet access and redundant voice capabilities to multi-tenanted buildings.

Gillette Global Network prepares a building for broadband access by upgrading its infrastructure with a fiber-optic backbone, and connecting the building to the Internet and the public switched telephone network. Gillette Global Network then has the ability to provide a range of products and services to the tenants of those buildings. To ensure top quality service to both its landlord partners and tenant customers, Gillette Global Network also provides dedicated technical expertise to oversee each one of its wired buildings.

For more information on Gillette Global Network, Inc., building owners or building managers should contact Leo Paytas, president, Lit Building division, at 212-906-0100 or visit the website at www.ggn.com.

This release is available on the KCSA Public Relations Worldwide website at www.kcsa.com