Internet Appliance Inc. Joins Embedded Linux Consortium As Charter Member

Business Wire, May 8, 2000

Business Editors & High-tech Writers

FREMONT, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 8, 2000

Internet Appliance Inc., pioneer of the multifunction VPN Appliance(TM), has been named a charter member of the Embedded Linux Consortium (ELC).

The consortium is a recently formed coalition of companies and engineers with a shared mission of promoting and implementing the Linux operating system in embedded applications.

As a charter ELC member, Internet Appliance will help drive efforts to increase the depth and breadth of Linux adoption in the embedded market and accelerate the speed of that adoption, a role that is expected to increase IA's visibility as a leader in the security appliance market.

"Internet Appliance is proud to be among the charter members of the Embedded Linux Consortium," said Gregory Hauw, Internet Appliance's president and CEO. "We believe the ELC will play a key role in the open-source movement and will drive the adoption and promotion of Linux for embedded applications."

"The Embedded Linux Consortium is interested in promoting the viability of Linux as a preferred platform for embedded computers," said Murry Shohat, acting Executive Director. "Internet Appliance is an excellent example of Linux' versatility. It's the backbone of the company's multifunction Internet security appliance, the INTERNETpro(TM), which incorporates everything from VPN to a firewall to web-hosting."

About the ELC

The Embedded Linux Consortium, a vendor-neutral nonprofit organization, was formed at the Embedded Systems Conference in Chicago in March. Its mission is to make Linux the number-one operating system choice for developers designing embedded systems. The 70-member ELC will provide a forum where vendors and engineers can work together to advance embedded Linux. More information is available at http://www.embedded-linux.org.

About Internet Appliance

The concept of secure Internet access solutions packaged in a server appliance was pioneered by Internet Appliance Inc., The VPN Appliance Company(TM) and leading supplier of multifunction Internet security appliances. The company has created and trademarked a whole new market definition, VPN Appliance(TM), which is the combination of virtual private networking with state-of-the-art encryption technology, a wide selection of WAN connectivity and other key Internet applications such as firewall, URL blocking and filtering, web caching, web server, mail server and file/print services.

Established in 1997, the company is headquartered in Fremont, with engineering labs located in Singapore. The company announced that it had secured $15 million in second-round venture capital funding on April 7. For more information, visit the company web site at http://www.internetappliance.com.