GTS Broadens European Reach

European broadband service provider Global TeleSystems Monday introduced
dedicated Internet access in 10 European countries.

Global TeleSystem’s (GTS)
broadband enabled Internet access is available in the United Kingdom,
France, Germany, Belgium, Ukraine, Russia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland
and Hungary.

GTS plans to extend their service offering to seven other countries by the end
of 2000, including the Netherlands, Sweden, Ireland, Norway, Spain, Italy
and Denmark.

The high-speed service is built on the back of GTS’s “Ebone” network, one
of the largest Tier-1 Internet backbones in Europe.

H. Brian Thompson, GTS chairman and chief executive officer, said GTS is
already recognized as a leading Central European carrier, extending its
reach to Western Europe is an integral part of their e-commerce service
expansion plan.

“GTS is recognized as the Internet platform of Europe for carriers and
ISPs. We are extending that end-to-end service and quality advantage to
more and more businesses, particularly those with pan-European needs,”
Thompson said.

According to Thompson the European e-commerce market is projected to exceed
US $1.5 trillion by 2004.

“The opportunity to expand that position further into Western Europe is
enormous,” Thompson added.
“We intend to be a major provider of these services.”

GTS provides borderless Internet access throughout Europe, offering
e-commerce service and carrier services in 20 European countries. GTS
utilizes dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) technology to
operate its network spanning more than 132,000 “wavelength” kilometers.