SAN FRANCISCO, April 17, 2006 — Yipes Enterprise Services, Inc. today introduced the most aggressive and comprehensive network Service Level Agreements (SLA) available in the enterprise network services marketplace. The SLA demonstrates the dramatic advancement in global Carrier Ethernet service reliability and the advantage of Ethernet-based networks over other network service options such as the Internet and frame relay. The Yipes performance guarantees also provide assurances to enterprise customers supporting voice over IP (VoIP), real-time videoconferencing, mission critical enterprise applications, business continuity, as well as next generation applications such as digital image sharing, electronic trading and on-demand applications.

 

The new Yipes network services SLA, available on all new service orders, includes industry-leading benchmarks for vital metrics such as network availability, latency, jitter and packet delivery. Additionally, Yipes guarantees mean time to repair (MTTR), on-time installations and on-demand bandwidth upgrades. The Company said the move comes in response to growing market demand for stronger network performance assurances and reflects significant advances in Yipes' network and systems capabilities. The new SLA is accompanied by the launch of Yipes HawkEye^SM, a unique network performance measurement system that permits customer access to detailed real-time traffic monitoring, management, analysis and reporting. Yipes HawkEye^SM is the first system of its kind to measure performance across a multi-vendor, global Carrier Ethernet network. The system, developed by Yipes, is based on technology from its key technology partners.

 

Network availability is the percentage of time that a customer is able to transmit data across the Yipes network. Yipes' SLA provides for 100% network availability. In 2005, Yipes deployed Ethernet Automated Protection Switching (EAPS) to provide SONET-like network reliability and Virtual Private LAN Services (VPLS) for increased scalability.

 

Network latency is a key element of the new Yipes network services SLA and is a measurement of speed in packet transmission across a network. While most other providers only offer a U.S. network-wide average latency, Yipes is unique in offering route-specific guarantees within and between each of the metro areas it serves. For example, in each metro, Yipes guarantees an average of 5 milliseconds of latency.

 

Network jitter, the variation of latency, represents the recurring changes in the timing of a data stream. Excess jitter degrades voice quality, makes video appear jerky and significantly impacts network application performance. Controlling jitter has become increasingly important as more enterprises move to time-sensitive applications such as multiple-feed video conferencing and VoIP telephony.

 

Effective today, Yipes is offering customers a jitter SLA of just .25 milliseconds (250 microseconds) as measured across Yipes' global Ethernet network. Most industry SLAs guarantee a jitter metric of 1 millisecond (1000 microseconds) or higher. Yipes' jitter SLA is more aggressive than most SLAs because Ethernet is inherently less prone to the variability in performance associated with routed networks, such as the public Internet.

 

Packet delivery measures the percentage of data packets successfully delivered and is the leading barometer in determining the consistency and reliability of any network. Under its new SLA, Yipes is offering a guarantee of 99.9 percent delivery.

 

The above network metrics are measured with the newly developed Yipes HawkEye^SM network performance measurement system. The innovative Yipes HawkEye^SM measurement data is made available to customers via the YipesCARE^SM web portal where customers can view real-time graphs showing network performance and utilization statistics.

 

"Yipes developed HawkEye^SM from the ground up as a truly innovative set of network management tools that fully integrate into Yipes' existing back-office systems,"said Dr. Kamran Sistanizadeh, Yipes chief technology officer. "Measurements are applied on a global basis, with consistent service level metrics and a single monitoring portal for ease of use and uniform service presentation. The high level of granularity delivered by Yipes HawkEye^SM provides unprecedented performance control for time-sensitive, data-intensive industries such as financial services and health care"

 

Yipes also recently added to its SLA a five minute guarantee to implement changes in bandwidth requested via its exclusive Yipes NOW^SM web-based provisioning tool. With Yipes NOW^SM , customers can instantly scale bandwidth in 1 Mbps increments and pay only for bandwidth requested. The result is unparalleled flexibility for managing new application requirements or responding to real-time needs or emergencies. The Company was recently granted a second patent on the customer-centered service level management tool at the heart of its Yipes NOW^SM feature.

 

"Enterprises are embracing Ethernet services for greater bandwidth at lower cost, but they also want assured support for mission-critical applications like real-time data backup, offsite disaster recovery, VoIP and two-way video transmission,"said Stan Hubbard, senior analyst at telecommunications research firm, Heavy Reading. "Robust SLAs, like the one offered by Yipes, will help Ethernet services play an integral roll in the broader enterprise paradigm shift toward on-demand business."

 

"Our new SLA and Yipes HawkEye^SM represent significant advances to our next generation service delivery platform and the future of global Ethernet services,"said John Scanlon, CEO of Yipes. "By redefining industry standards for performance, reliability and control, Yipes is once again setting the pace in the marketplace with enterprise customers set to reap the benefits."

 

"As more and more businesses migrate mission-critical and network performance-sensitive applications to Ethernet-based wide area networks, they are demanding a highly reliable network and the tools to make the management of their network simple and flexible. These tools reinforce Yipes' position as the provider of choice for the enterprise, particularly in verticals such as finance, legal, health care and other industries that demand the highest levels of performance and support from their network service providers."

 

About Yipes Enterprise Services, Inc.
Winner of the Metro Ethernet Forum 2005 Service Provider of the Year Award for Outstanding Innovation, Yipes Enterprise Services, Inc. is the leading global provider of managed, end-to-end Ethernet solutions for enterprise customers. Yipes offers a uniquely scalable suite of networking services that combine the speed, simplicity and cost effectiveness of native Ethernet with Yipes proprietary bandwidth-on-demand functionality. Yipes provides services in and between major metropolitan markets including: Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Hong Kong, Houston, Los Angeles, London, Miami, New York, Philadelphia, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle, Tokyo and Washington DC. For more information, visit www.yipes.com.

 

Contact:
Don Hunt, Kelly Smallegan-Maas
Lambert, Edwards & Associates, Inc.
616 233 0500 phone
mail@lambert-edwards.com