`I Love You'- A Day in the Life of an Application Service Provider - Industry Trend or Event

Edge: Work-Group Computing Report, May 22, 2000

It's about 7 a.m. on Thursday, May 4, 2000.

Ed Barrett, president of Eltrax Technology Services Group, gets an unexpected message on his alphanumeric pager from the Eltrax office in Sydney, Australia. Even more unexpected is the message: "I Love You."

Without much notice, the message from Ed is broadcasted in his name via pager and e-mail to everyone at Eltrax - all 900 employees worldwide.

"We're close, but not that close," said Ron Nocera, operations manager for Eltrax, after receiving the "I Love You" page as he drove to Eltrax's Atlanta headquarters. "I knew it was a virus. There was absolutely no doubt in my mind. From this moment, I launched our virus eradication process."

Ron immediately phones Eltrax E-mail Systems Engineer Dan Van Hout to tell Dan that he has received a page from Ed saying, "I Love You." Ed's amorous message is the virus that would later that day be known as "The Love Bug," the world's most crippling computer virus to date.

These are the days Dan lives for. Armed with years of experience, Dan sets his sights on cutting off the virus before it chokes Eltrax and renders the company's e-mail system useless. At 7:30 a.m., he shuts down all e-mail services and attempts to rid the system of the virus using the standard virus protectors - no success. By now the virus had spread and duplicated itself 12,000 times within the Eltrax e-mail system.

But, Dan had an ace up his sleeve - Antigen, a best of breed virus detection software application from Sybari Software (www.sybari.com). Antigen worked; the virus was eradicated -- all before most Eltrax employees knew that the virus had existed in the company's network.

"Eltrax used its own medicine on the `I Love You' virus," said Audley Dean, vice president of engineering and operations for Eltrax's ASP business unit. "Eltrax's quick response to the Love Bug virus was not a fluke - it's what we do everyday. Not only for Eltrax as a company, but also for our customers."

Eltrax provides innovative, reliable and secure Web-based and network-based business solutions, including iMessaging, an email and collaboration application, to small and mid-sized businesses.

"This is the type of high level protection we offer our customers through iMessaging," said Denise Grey, president of Eltrax's ASP business unit. "This is a great benefit to small and mid-size companies who would not ordinarily be able to afford extensive virus protection and access to such a quick response team effort."

Antigen is a key ingredient within the Eltrax iMessaging ASP package. All iMessaging customers receive a system-cleaning dose of Antigen. With Eltrax ASP services there are no up-front capital investments, implementation or maintenance costs. Customers can rent Microsoft Exchange, access it over the Web and leave the technical support, management and maintenance to Eltrax.

iMessaging is business-quality, rented, hassle-free Microsoft Exchange Internet messaging and collaboration service powered by Eltrax. Small and mid-size organizations can access all the features inherent in Exchange for advanced collaboration - even telecommuters and remote offices - to increase workforce productivity. With flexible pricing and premium add-on services, customers pay for what they need as they need it. For one all-inclusive monthly subscription price, customers receive Exchange messaging and collaboration, plus intuitive self-administrative tools, Eltrax's standard JumpStart implementation, application hosting and 24 by 7 customer care.

Eltrax is a full service application services provider (ASP) that plans, builds and runs the technology that high-growth businesses need to take care of their internal and external customers. Eltrax offers application service provider (ASP) services including a Web-based customer relationship management (CRM) ASP service and iMessaging, an email and collaboration application.

Eltrax is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, and is continually expanding its portfolio of services to new offices, business partners and agents worldwide. For more information, visit the Eltrax Web site at www.eltrax.com or contact Hank Ernest at 678-589-3525.