Lycos is chosen to provide Internet search functionality at Advantech's broadband portal

Lycos is chosen to provide Internet search functionality at Advantech's broadband portal Lycos becomes search engine at www.thalamus.nu, Europe's most advanced portal for the intelligent home. The portal www.thalamus.nu will help landlords and networks owners provide broadband services to the households. The portal's first release is planned to go live in April. The co-operation with Lycos is yet another proof that Advantech is serious on becoming a significant player within the broadband segment. In order for the tenants to stay clear of the bottlenecks on the Internet, the most popular web sites and large files such as movies, games and programs, will on a regular basis be downloaded to nearby servers to reach maximum speed in the networks that Advantech use in the various buildings. www.thalamus.nu will be the natural way of keeping informed of the building and your local area. It will also be the given place to start finding local information, communication, entertainment and education. "Lycos, one of the world's leading actors within its area, with their fast and easy-to-use search engine, plays an important part in our ambition to, both on a local and global basis, deliver ease-of-use customer satisfaction with highest possible availability" says Thomas Rebermark, Marketing Director of Advantech. "The cooperation with Advantech is of great importance for our activities in the Scandinavian region, and part of our strategy to position ourselves as one of the leading players within digitalized media in Scandinavia. It is with great entusiasm we look forward to this cooperation", says Anna Bergstrand, Managing Director Lycos Scandinavia. "Since our broadband portal www.thalamus.nu is a business critical system, it is important for us to choose partners with great experience from both information databases and large development projects" says Thomas Rebermark. Facts * An example of useful services concerning the tenants' nearby environment and information is: the possibility of booking your laundry hours, sauna and joint gathering rooms from your computer (thalamus® access), note boards with information from the landlords, buy&sell, apartment info (thalamus® info), possibility to record defaults (thalamus® net) etc, games, programs, video-on-demand (thalamus® Internet) and various news; everything according to the tenants' wishes. During phases two and three, filing archives, games and chatting possiblities with other tenants, telephony, individual heating measurings, video- and program-on- demand is to be offered. Since the landlords are offered to push certain parts of the portal, the tenants themselves will have a large opportunity to influence the content. * Advantech AB (www.advantech.se) is an independent actor within the rapidly growing area of broadband. The company offers the market's most extensive broadband service called Thalamus®. It includes Internet access which meets the requirements for the regular surfer as well as the most advanced remote access worker. At the same time Advantech is the only company meeting the landlords' needs for energy management, information, media and telephony. Thalamus® is delivered over optical fibre, cable-TV and Ethernet (LAN), and in a near future also over wireless solutions. Advantech AB are currently in a strong phase of expansion, and has today offices in Ängelholm, Malmö, Halmstad, Göteborg and Stockholm. The company has provided services to Sweden's landlords since the start in 1987. * Lycos Europe is a powerful network of premium Internet brands. The network is one of Europe's leading Internet destinations combining connectivity, content and community services. Each brand offers distinct features and targets a specific web audience. The brands constitute multiple entry points to the network and thereby aggregate and circulate a broad audience of users. On any day, millions of web users are navigating, communicating or publishing their own content on Lycos Europe. Through its high reach among European Internet users and the possibility to target specific user groups, Lycos Europe is a prime destination for online advertisers and e-commerce partners. Lycos Europe has pan-European presence with local language web sites in 11 countries (Belgium, Denmark, Germany, France, Italy, Netherlands,Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Spain and the UK). For more information, please contact: Anna Bergstrand, Managing Director, Lycos Bertelsmann Scandinavia, Tel 0706-35 01 02, anna.bergstrand@lycos.de Thomas Rebermark, Marketing Director, Advantech, Tel 08-601 2174, Mobil 0703-240193, E-post thomas.rebermark@advantech.se ------------------------------------------------------------ Please visit http://www.bit.se for further information The following files are available for download: http://www.bit.se/bitonline/2000/02/16/20000216BIT00400/bit0001.pdf http://www.bit.se/bitonline/2000/02/16/20000216BIT00400/bit0002.doc