USA.Net Signs Portal Deals in Europe, Canada, Australia

E-mail outsourcer USA.net Tuesday said that it has signed four new Web portal customers in the
U.K.,
Europe, Canada and Australia.

The deal will enable the portals to offer
e-mail services to their customers, and USA.Net claims the move will help its partners build customer loyalty.

The four portals are the U.K.-based hub for mobile executives
biztravelclub.com; European web
development and media company
Parallel Interactive;
Canadian online investment
site Cash Cow; and the
Australian community guide site Ezyfind.com,
which caters to communities in eight countries.

“The international market is predicted to hold more than 65 per cent of all
Internet users by 2002,” said John Street, president and CEO of
USA.net. “With this explosion in Internet usage, these portals are
leveraging USA.net’s reliable, feature-rich email to differentiate
themselves and keep their customers coming back.”

Street added that each portal will contribute revenue to USA.Net on a per-mailbox basis.

The four portals are a significant expansion of USA.net’s customer base,
which consists mainly of large corporations who outsource e-mail services. They include American Express, United Airlines, and
Hewlett-Packard.

The U.K’s biztravelclub.com enables business travellers to link up
with each other during trips anywhere in the world, allowing xecutives who join
the club to post their travel itineraries and contact information to
the site.

Europe’s Parallel Interactive, which specialises in business-to-business
portals aimed at vertical markets, will be using USA.net’s e-mail
branded as Topmail and incorporated into its service offerings.

Canada’s Cash Cow Magazine profiles publicly traded companies, and offers
stock quotes, a chat room, news and a day-trading club. It is a subsidiary of NewTrends
Holdings, Inc.

Australia’s International Strategies, the founder of Ezyfind.com,
provides Web portals and online stores to what it calls
communities of interest, or COINS, across national boundaries. It
combines local information sources about employment, real estate, etc.,
with e-commerce and web communications.

USA.net manages over 13 million mailboxes worldwide.