ENX Chooses Ebone to Construct Its pan-European Extranet Network

    LONDON & PARIS--Dec. 13, 2001--ENX, the largest consortium of European car-makers and automotive equipment suppliers including Ford, BMW, DaimlerChrysler and Michelin, has chosen Ebone, the European leader in IP and broadband network services, to route its pan-European IP traffic.
    Initially, the project called ENX will provide automotive companies in France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK with an interoperable global communications infrastructure. In this way, IP traffic, such as EDI, CRM, graphical and financial data, logistics, market places and video conferences generated by collaborative exchanges can be carried in complete security. The infrastructure will handle traffic generated by traditional business operations (e.g. email and databases) as well as traffic from real-time application sharing.
    ENX was designed by the automotive industry for the automotive community. "By establishing ENX, we have constructed a uniformed communication platform on a pan-European basis," said Ralf von der Burg, Managing Director of ENX Association. "ENX results in optimised business processes, accelerating the automotive OEMs' spanned and continuous process chains." Today customers use ENX for a wide range of different requirements. "That is why we have chosen Ebone as an interconnection operator (CISP(1)) for our ENX operator in Europe". In the long term, Ebone's coverage will allow ENX to interconnect to other XNX(2) networks in Europe, United States and Japan.
    Ebone is able to meet all of ENX requirements. Ebone's pan-European network, which extends over 25,000 kilometres across Europe, connecting 69 European cities in 20 European countries and the United States, provides unparalled capacity to support ENX's growth and meet rising demands within the automotive industry for IP. "IP-driven communications ensure that the automotive industry can meet customer demand effectively. What is critical to the automotive industry is guaranteed security and network availability. Ebone is able to ensure that ENX users consistently experience peak performance with near zero congestion. It is also able to support efficient communications by offering bandwidth-on-demand in response to increasing capacity needs - ensuring consistency throughout peak periods," commented Christophe Lahaye, Vice President Southern Europe, Ebone.
    IP and broadband services selected by ENX in each country currently interconnect to Ebone's pan-European backbone, in order to gradually integrate new methods of IP-driven communication and production.
    Ebone, with its high speed IP network, is the leading European backbone handling over a quarter of European Internet users on its network. Ebone provides ENX and its suppliers with performance guarantees for speed, reliability, security and scalability that are unrivalled on this scale.

    About ENX

    The European Network Exchange Association was founded on June 15th, 2000. Purpose and ultimate goal of the organization was the construction and setup of a business network for the entire European automobile industry. Present members of the ENX Association are:

    OEM: Audi, BMW, DaimlerChrysler, Fiat, Ford, Karmann, MAN, PSA, Opel, Porsche, Renault, Volvo, VW.
    Suppliers: Bosch, Michelin, Siemens.
    Associations: ANFAC (Spain), GALIA (France), SMMT (UK), VDA (Germany).

    Companies in Germany and France are already using ENX productively.

    About Ebone

    Ebone, a division of Global TeleSystems, Inc. (GTS), is the original and most experienced broadband IP and optical networking company in Europe. Serving Europe's leading carriers, service providers, media companies and enterprises with the highest quality IP and optical networking services, Ebone's fibre and IP network extends more than 25,000 kilometres to nearly every major European city. Overall, Ebone has operations in 69 European cities plus the United States. Operating headquarters are in London. On 19 October 2001, GTS announced that it had signed a definitive share purchase agreement under which KPNQwest ("KPNQwest") (NASDAQ and ASE: KQIP) has agreed to acquire, under the terms and conditions in the agreement and subject to normal regulatory approvals, the business of Ebone and GTS Central Europe. For further information, please visit us at www.ebone.com.

    This press release contains certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, which are intended to be covered by the safe harbors created thereby. Investors are cautioned that all forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties. Although GTS believes that the assumptions underlying the forward-looking statements contained herein are reasonable, any of the assumptions could be inaccurate, and therefore, there can be no assurance that the forward-looking statements included in this press release will prove to be accurate. In light of the significant uncertainties inherent in the forward-looking statements included herein, the inclusion of such information should not be regarded as a representation by GTS or any other person that the objectives and plans of GTS will be achieved.

    (1) Certified Interconnection Service Provider
    (2) XNX = Several Networks: ENX, ANX, CNX, KNX, AANX