MOUNTAIN VIEW and SUNNYVALE, Calif. (May 19,
1997) - Netscape Communications Corporation and Actra
today announced that Netscape plans to distribute the full
line of Actra CrossCommerce products, introduced today by
Actra. Actra CrossCommerce is a new family of Internet
Commerce software solutions for buying, selling and
merchandising goods and services over the Internet. It
includes: ECXpert, OrderXpert Seller and OrderXpert Buyer in
addition to MerchantXpert and PublishingXpert.
Built from the ground up on open Internet standards and
leveraging the Netscape ONE open network environment, Actra
CrossCommerce delivers online solutions for both
business-to-business and business-to consumer online
commerce. As a distributor for the five new products,
Netscape will sell the Actra CrossCommerce product line to
enterprise customers in 47 countries through its worldwide
sales force. In addition, Netscape will dedicate and train
sales resources to sell the Actra CrossCommerce products
beginning immediately.
"With Actra CrossCommerce, Actra is building on
Netscape's vision of the Networked Enterprise and delivering
some of the first commercial Crossware applications, a new
class of applications that span operating systems, networks,
databases and devices and extend beyond the firewall to
include customers and partners into business processes,"
said Marc Andreessen, senior vice president of technology at
Netscape. "Netscape is making the new CrossCommerce products
available to our customers worldwide so enterprises can
leverage their Intranets for Internet and Extranet commerce
applications."
"Today's announcement crystallizes a crucial part of our
relationship with Netscape," said Jim Sha, president and CEO
of Actra, a joint venture of GE Information Services and
Netscape. "Netscape is a proven leader in selling software
solutions for online commerce with more than 2 years of
experience. The company's global efforts to distribute the
new CrossCommerce solutions will significantly broaden the
sales channels for and accelerate the customers acceptance
of these new products among Netscape's broad community of
enterprise customers."
Based on the popular Netscape Commercial Applications,
Actra CrossCommerce products provide a standards-based
solution that focuses on the needs of Fortune 1,000
companies. The new products provide online commerce
solutions – such as online publishing, retailing and order
fulfillment -- that link vendors with customers, partners
and suppliers. Actra CrossCommerce solutions integrate with
existing enterprise systems, extending them to the Internet,
while protecting EDI investments.
The Actra CrossCommerce family includes:
ECXpert - the foundation product of Actra's CrossCommerce
portfolio that delivers the equivalent of EDI for
theInternet.
OrderXpert - software for corporate buying and selling on
the Internet.
Includes OrderXpert Buyer, an Internet procurement system
that operates in a multi-supplier, inter-enterprise
environment. Also includes OrderXpert Seller, an electronic
product catalog that uses EDI technology for order
management via the Internet.
MerchantXpert - Internet retailing software based on
Netscape Merchant System for companies building
online,personalized Internet storefronts.
PublishingXpert - comprehensive Extranet publishing
software based on Netscape Publishing System for selling
content online.
ECXpert is the first CrossCommerce product scheduled to
be available from Netscape for the Sun Solaris 2.5.1
operating environment in June and for Windows NT 3.51 and
4.0 within two to three months. Pricing for ECXpert will be
per-processor-based. Availability of the other CrossCommerce
products from Netscape will be announced as each new product
becomes available during the course of 1997. Each Actra
CrossCommerce product will be individually priced based on a
per-processor pricing model. For more information please
contact Actra on 1-888-706-2600, Netscape on 1-800-638-7483
or GEIS on 1-800-560-4347.
Founded in April 1996, Actra is a joint venture between
Netscape Communications Corporation and GE Information
Services (GEIS). Benefiting from GEIS' market expertise as
the world's leading provider of business-to-business
Internet commerce services and Netscape's leading open
Internet software line, Actra provides next-generation
commerce solutions for both business-to-consumer and
business-to-business commerce markets. Additionally, Actra
is taking an active role in promoting open standards for
Internet commerce.
Netscape Communications Corporation is a premier provider
of open software for linking people and information over
enterprise networks and the Internet. The company offers a
full line of clients, servers, development tools and
commercial applications to create a complete platform for
next-generation, live online applications. Traded on NASDAQ
under the symbol "NSCP," Netscape Communications Corporation
is based in Mountain View, California.
Additional information on Netscape Communications
Corporation is available on the Internet at
http://home.netscape.com, by sending email to
info@netscape.com. Corporate customers can call 415-937-2555
while consumers can call 415-937-3777 for more information.
Netscape is a registered trademarks of Netscape
Communications Corporation in the United States and other
countries. Netscape's logos, Netscape
MerchantXpert, Netscape PublishingXpert and Netscape
product and service names are also trademarks of Netscape
Communications Corporation, which may be registered in other
countries. CrossCommerce, ECXpert and OrderXpert are
trademarks of Actra. All other products mentioned are
trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective
companies.
