Keynote to Launch Industry's First Credit Card Web Transaction Performance Index

Business Wire, August 16, 2004

SAN MATEO, Calif. -- Keynote Systems (Nasdaq:KEYN)

--Consumers Will Find Index a Useful Tool in Selecting Credit Cards Optimized for Viewing Charges and Paying Bills Online

--Importance of Index Underscored as 13% of U.S. Consumers Now Pay Credit Card Bills Online

--Keynote Dominates in E-Business Transaction Benchmarking Indices for the Financial Services Industry; First Results of Credit Card Index Due in 30 Days

--New Credit Card Index Builds on Keynote's Existing Family of Financial Services Indices that Already Includes Online Broker and Banking Indices

--Credit Card Sites Planned for Index Include: American Express, Capital One, Chase, Citibank, Diner's Club, Discover, First U.S.A, MBNA and Providian

Keynote Systems (Nasdaq:KEYN), The Internet Performance Authority(R), expanded its index coverage of the financial services industry today with the announcement of the world's first e-business transaction index for the credit card industry. "The Keynote Credit Card Web Transaction Performance Index," will benchmark the transaction speed and reliability of leading credit card Web sites as experienced by real users around the country. As consumers increasingly head to the Web for viewing credit card charges and paying their credit card bills, the new index will be a useful e-business performance benchmark and assist consumers in selecting which credit card providers are best prepared to provide an optimal quality of online experience.

Sites currently planned for inclusion in the new index include americanexpress.com, capitalone.com, chase.com, Citibank.com, dinersclubnorthamerica.com, discovercard.com, firstusa.com, mbna.com and Providian.com.

Initial results of the new credit card index are planned for public release within 30 days.

The new transaction index underscores Keynote's strong customer base among leaders in the financial services industry and its commitment to deliver indices that serve the needs of important financial services sectors. Keynote is the trailblazer in e-business transaction performance benchmarking and launched the world's first e-business transaction index for the online broker industry in June of 1999. The Keynote E-Banking Web Transaction Index launched in August 2003.

The need for credit card Web benchmarking data for use by consumers and the credit card companies themselves is growing increasingly clear as a recent report by Cybersource found that 99% of Web sites offer general purpose card payments (payment made with Visa, American Express, Master Card or Discover cards) to their site visitors. And increasing numbers of Americans are taking advantage of offerings by credit card providers to receive, view and pay credit card charges online. An April 2004 Yankee Group report found that 13% of U.S. consumers pay their credit card bills online and 14% receive and view their statements online.

"As more people use credit cards to pay for goods and services online, the risk of other people gaining access to credit card information not their own and making unauthorized purchases online has also increased," said Roopak Patel, senior Internet analyst in Keynote's public services division. "Rather than wait for their monthly credit card statements, more people are going to the Web sites run by their credit card providers to make sure there have been no unauthorized charges during the month. And of course consumers are increasingly paying their credit card bills online. It is imperative that credit card companies have a deep understanding for the performance aspects of their site, and of competitor sites, as experienced by end users, so they can continually optimize their site's performance and keep their customers happy. Our new index is designed to serve this growing need."

The Keynote Credit Card Web Transaction Performance Index is the first of its kind to systematically measure the speed and reliability of leading credit card Web sites for performing common multi-step tasks. To create this particular index, Keynote's measurement computers in 10 cities around the U.S. "click through" the same steps an actual person might perform: entering the particular URL of the credit card site they wish to visit, clicking on the login button, logging in using account information, selecting steps necessary for viewing "recent charges" and logging out of the site.

The Keynote Credit Card Web Transaction Performance Index will be published weekly on Keynote's Web site at http://www.keynote.com/solutions/solutions_ps_index.html.

Keynote has historically seen an improvement in overall performance results, over time, whenever it has launched a new vertical-based Web transaction performance index. The goal of the index is to help the credit card industry measure and manage the performance of its Web sites and optimize the experience of people receiving, viewing and paying credit card charges online.

The Keynote Credit Card Web Transaction Performance Index is designed to reflect the speed and reliability of the most well known credit card sites with a large online presence. Going beyond home page performance, the credit card transaction index will provide deep insight into the performance of these high traffic credit card Web sites.