Tucows Gains Market Share: Outperforms Market for New Registrations in Q2 2001; Second Largest Registrar Increases Market Share to 15.2% In Volatile Market

Business Wire, August 1, 2001

Business Editors & High Tech Writers

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug. 1, 2001

Tucows Inc., a leading provider of wholesale digital products to Internet service providers and web hosting companies worldwide, announced today that it has outperformed the market again and increased market share for new registrations of generic Top Level Domain names (gTLDs) processed through Tucows OpenSRS, in the second quarter of 2001.

Tucows Inc. employs a wholesale distribution strategy and has more than 5,000 channel partners worldwide. While the market experienced a decline of 9.67% (up from a 27.9% decline in Q1), Tucows' wholesale strategy has led to a 15.2% share of the market in Q2, an increase from 14.5% in Q1.

Tucows again gained ground on the market leader VeriSign Inc. (Nasdaq:VRSN), which formerly held the monopoly on registrations in .com, .net, and .org. In Q2, Tucows processed a total of 543,125 new registrations (including transfers), including 106,600 new names processed on behalf of other registrars. With this performance, Tucows surpassed Register.com, Inc.'s (Nasdaq:RCOM) approximately 314,000 new registrations (including transfers) for Q2, to solidify its number two position behind VeriSign.

"We're pleased to have outperformed the competition in growing our market share for new .com, .net and .org registrations again," said Elliot Noss, CEO and President of Tucows Inc. "The significant number of registration transfers from other registrars is also testament to the quality of our products, services and support. Moreover, Tucows' performance this quarter provides further evidence of the success of our wholesale model and recognizes that ISPs and web hosting companies are the vendors of choice for Internet users."

With the emergence of the highly anticipated new .INFO and .BIZ registries, Noss said that he is looking forward to Tucows' continued growth in the marketplace. "With the launch of the new gTLDs, .INFO (which officially began its Sunrise period on July 25th) and .BIZ, we are anticipating strong registration volumes in the upcoming quarters based on the support of our channel partners," continued Noss.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
                Q2 2001             Q1 2001      Q4 2000    Q3 2000
                (New and            (New)        (New)      (New)
                Transfers)
--------------- ------------------- ------------ ---------- ----------

Verisign/NSI(b)     1,000,000         880,000    1,550,000  2,200,000
--------------- ------------------- ------------ ---------- ----------
Tucows          Tucows    Tucows
                Total(a)  Registrar   448,288      492,202    585,097
                --------- ---------
                543,125   436,525
--------------- ------------------- ------------ ---------- ----------
Register.com(b)       314,000         306,252      504,673    804,110
--------------- ------------------- ------------ ---------- ----------

(a) Tucows Total - includes registrations on behalf of other
registrars

(b) Verisign/NSI's and Register.com numbers quoted from their press
releases or quarterly results conference calls

Tucows Inc. recently announced that it has signed a definitive merger agreement with Infonautics, Inc. (OTCBB:INFO), a provider of personalized information agents and Internet sites. The merger transaction, which is subject to shareholder and regulatory approvals, is expected to close during the third quarter of 2001. For information about the merger, including the S4 filing, link to: http://about.tucows.com/mergers/.

About Tucows

Tucows Inc. is a leading distributor of e-business services and applications on the Internet. With a network of more than 5,000 resellers in more than 100 countries around the world, Tucows is one of the largest networks of its kind. The Tucows site offers more than 30,000 software titles in libraries located around the world, providing users with a fast local download. Tucows is an ICANN-accredited registrar and a leading provider of wholesale domain name registrations for country code and generic TLDs, plus Web Certificates. For more information, please visit http://www.opensrs.org or http://partner.tucows.com or go to http://www.tucows.com and click on Partner Home.

This news release contains, in addition to historical information, forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements may include statements regarding, for example, the launch and eventual success of the .INFO and .BIZ Top Level Domains, the continued growth of Tucows' business, and the closing of the pending Tucows-Infonautics merger. Such statements are based on management's current expectations and are subject to a number of uncertainties and risks that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in the forward-looking statements. All forward-looking statements included in this document are based on information available to Tucows as of the date of this document, and Tucows assumes no obligation to update such forward-looking statements.