GTE Makes Communication Easier through Next-Generation, Enhanced Internet Services; IP Fax and Internet Call Waiting Services Available Immediately.

WASHINGTON - Furthering its focus on the high-growth data market, GTE Corp. today announced at ComNet '99 the immediate availability of two new high-speed communication services, Internet Protocol (IP) Fax and Internet Call Waiting. These two new offers, the first of a suite of enhanced IP services that GTE is developing, leverage GTE's new nationwide high-speed, private fiber network to deliver high levels of reliability.

GTE Internetworking is currently offering IP Fax services to corporate customers, ISPs, carriers and other resellers. Internet Call Waiting is being offered to a limited number of customers today, with full market availability in March. In addition to IP Fax and Internet Call Waiting, GTE Internetworking is developing a suite of enhanced IP services that will dramatically expand and simplify business and personal communications. These future services will include Unified Messaging IP Voice Mail, Voice-Over-IP services and Web Call Center - all to be released throughout 1999.

These new enhanced IP services, the culmination of extensive development and testing conducted by GTE, are being brought to market by GTE Internetworking - leveraging the 30-year history and knowledge of IP and the Internet gained through GTE's acquisition of BBN. Each service delivers leading-edge solutions to customers over GTE's new nationwide, high-speed, high-capacity, private fiber network, the Global Network Infrastructure (GNI).

The GNI, which GTE today announced is more than two-thirds operational, is a managed private network that ensures high levels of reliability and efficiency and provides GTE and its partners the ability to deliver high levels of customer service.

"We are extremely excited to enter the enhanced IP services space," said Paul O'Brien, vice president of GTE Internetworking and general manager of IP telecom. "Our unique expertise in Internet and telecommunications technologies, combined with our industry-leading partners, underscore GTE's commitment to its data strategy and delivering best-of-breed IP services to the marketplace. IP Fax and Internet Call Waiting are clear evidence that GTE's investment in the Internet is paying off with real services, available today. These enhanced IP services, supported by a state-of-the-art transport facility like the GNI, positions GTE to be the next-generation telecommunications provider."

"Corporations around the world understand the strategic importance of IP Telephony, and corporations are moving traditional PSTN services like fax to the more flexible and efficient and global IP network," added Jeff Pulver, an industry analyst and publisher of "The Pulver Report." "This move allows a consolidation of communication services, improved business productivity and a reduction in transmission costs. Fax services continue to be integral to conducting business around the world and given the efficiencies associated with IP Fax, there is a strong opportunity for GTE in this market."

IP Fax Available Today

The first of these next-generation IP services to be available nationwide is GTE's IP Fax service. Targeted to businesses, ISPs, carriers, and other service and equipment providers, the new service enables organizations to substantially reduce the time and cost associated with managing fax communications. GTE IP Fax allows an enterprise to outsource its entire fax needs and capabilities. Subscribers can send and receive faxes at their desktop anywhere in the world using GTE's servers and network to manage and carry the data.

Utilizing NetCentric Corporation's FaxStorm technology, GTE's IP Fax service includes desktop, broadcast, redialer and in-box fax functions and allows enhanced PC-to-fax, enhanced fax-to-fax, enhanced fax-to-e-mail, remote access and delivery status anywhere in the world to users with an Internet connection. GTE Internetworking and NetCentric (Bedford, Mass.) have worked in close partnership to develop and deliver these robust and innovative capabilities.

GTE IP Fax is already delivering value to Texas Instruments: "When we were looking to implement a fax solution to support our SAP implementation and other applications as part of T.I.'s open business systems transition, we examined the options of an in-house service, or outsourcing to a service like GTE's IP Fax Service," said Phil Coup, Texas Instrument's Vice President, and manager of T.I.'s "Open Systems Transition" program. "GTE's service provides a clear advantage in terms of robustness, business flexibility and total cost-of-ownership over deploying our own service internally."

Internet Call Waiting at the Home

Internet Call Waiting (ICW) will allow Internet users with a single telephone line the ability to monitor and manage incoming voice calls while they are online. This service reduces the need for multiple telephone lines while adding the ability to screen and log calls. ICW subscribers will be notified of the incoming call on their screen and will be able to send a pre-programmed message to the caller, receive a voice message as an e-mail attachment, or take the call. GTE Internetworking partnered with Info Interactive Inc. (Halifax, Nova Scotia) to makes Internet Call Waiting a reality. GTE is currently offering the service on a limited basis with national availability beginning in March.

The GNI Makes Enhanced IP Services Possible

With 12,000 of the planned 17,000-mile private fiber network already active, the GNI is the infrastructure for GTE's enhanced IP services. GTE has designed the GNI from the ground up to provide the capacity and architecture necessary to deliver multiple enhanced IP services in a highly reliable, efficient, and flexible manner.

This architecture design allows for easy implementation of future services such as voice and video over IP. Upon completion, GTE's GNI will be one of the most secure, reliable, high-capacity, end-to-end, multi-service, private networks in the industry. The GNI provides virtually limitless capacity to meet the demands of GTE customers' most data-intensive applications.

GTE and Cisco Systems jointly developed extensions to the H323 signaling protocol that enable the introduction of wide range of services such as Fax Over IP, Internet Call Waiting, Unified Messaging and Voice Over IP. These extensions enable GTE to implement an efficient IP telecom network architecture that supports these enhanced services.

"The GTE IP network exemplifies New World leadership, and we congratulate GTE on the roll-out of a suite of new services that will provide more functionality to businesses and consumers," said Don Listwin, executive vice president of Cisco Systems. "Cisco and GTE will continue to collaborate to develop leading edge products and services."

Future GTE Internetworking Enhanced IP Services Include:

About GTE Internetworking

GTE Internetworking, a unit of GTE Corporation (NYSE:GTE) offers customers, from consumers to Fortune 500 companies, a full spectrum of integrated Internet services using IP networking technologies. GTE Internetworking delivers complete network solutions, including dial-up and dedicated Internet access, high-performance Web hosting, virtual private networks, managed Internet security, network management, systems integration, and Web-based application development for integrating the Internet into business operations. GTE Internetworking draws upon its expertise in funded research and development of advanced technologies, including satellite networks, packet radio networks, multi-gigabit routers, network and information security, and speech recognition, and GTE's strong existing telecommunications services, including local and long distance, wireless, paging, video, and Internet. With 1997 revenues of more than $23 billion, GTE is one the world's largest telecommunications companies and a leading provider of integrated voice, video and data services. Additional information about GTE Internetworking and GTE Corp. can be found on the Internet at http://www.gte.com.

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