Neopost Online Signs Exclusive Electronic Postage Agreement With eBay and Half.com

Neopost Online Signs Exclusive Electronic Postage Agreement With eBay and Half.com; Continued Growth of Online Marketplaces Fuels the Need For Consumer-Friendly Postage Services
From BUSINESS WIRE, April 17th, 2001

REDWOOD CITY, Calif., Apr 17, 2001 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Neopost Online Inc. has
today been named the exclusive electronic postage provider for eBay and
Half.com in a move to provide the companies' online sellers with fast and
convenient postage solutions. Under the agreement, eBay, the world's online marketplace, and eBay
subsidiary, Half.com, will offer their members Neopost Online's PC-based
postage solution, Simply Postage(R). "Our agreement with eBay and Half.com reinforces our strategy of targeting
high-volume package shippers," said David Crisp, CEO of Neopost Online. "eBay
and Half.com are the ideal business communities for Simply Postage." Simply Postage combines a meter, printer and scale into a small, hand-sized
desktop unit. This device not only saves time, it also factors in weight and
class when determining postage price to ensure that users do not overpay for
shipping. As most online sellers lack the mailroom facilities of large companies, using
Simply Postage fulfills their need for a convenient, cost-effective way to
generate postage for their shipments. A typical home-based shipper can easily
spend at least an hour a week — more than a full work-week every year —
traveling to and from shipping locations and waiting in lines. "eBay and Half are incredibly vibrant online trading communities and the
availability of a convenient postage service is important to their success,"
said Jeff Jordan, senior vice president, eBay U.S. "Because Simply Postage
supports all classes of postal service mail, including Media Mail, our
relationship with Neopost Online offers our users — who spend hundreds of
millions of dollars on postage annually — a value-added solution to help them
ship goods directly from their home or office."
About Simply Postage While other online postage products offer hardware or software-based
solutions, Simply Postage combines the convenience of a palm-sized hardware
unit with the capabilities of computer software. With its integrated postage
meter, scale and printer, Simply Postage empowers small businesses and home
offices by enabling them to have the services of a post office on their
desktop. Simply Postage allows users to download postage 7 days a week, 24
hours a day. The compact, space-saving unit weighs envelopes and packages up
to 4.4 lbs and will automatically calculate and print exact postage. If a user
sends the same type of mail on a regular basis, for example, a first class
letter, the InstaStamp feature enables the unit to print a certain rate of
postage at the touch of a button. Simply Postage doesn't require address entry
or Internet access — a modem is all that is needed to download postage.
Simply Postage prints postage for any class of mail. It also tracks a user's
postage spending, a feature that is helpful for many small businesses.
About Neopost Online Based in Redwood City, Calif., Neopost Online is a subsidiary of The Neopost
Group, the second-largest mailroom equipment provider in the world, and the
leader in Europe. With more than 70 years of experience, The Neopost Group,
headquartered outside Paris, France, is a pioneer in the introduction of
electronics in the postage and shipping industry. The Neopost Group has
customers in more than 70 countries and is listed on the Paris Stock Exchange.
About eBay eBay is the world's online marketplace. Founded in 1995, eBay created a
powerful marketplace for the sale of goods and services by individuals and
small businesses. On any given day, there are millions of items listed on the
site across thousands of categories. eBay enables trade on a local, national
and international basis with local sites in 60 markets in the United States
and country-specific sites in the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, Austria,
France, Italy, Japan, Korea and Australia. With the acquisition of Half.com in
2000, eBay's community now benefits from a marketplace combining traditional
auction-style trading and Half.com's set-price trading.
About Half.com Half.com, an eBay company, is the largest fixed price person-to-person
marketplace on the Internet, where people can easily buy and sell new and
previously owned products, combining the bargains of an auction with the ease
of purchasing from of a retailer. Founded in July 1999, the company's
expanding marketplace currently includes books, CDs, movies and video games.
It is one of the most visited shopping sites on the Internet, and through its
ever-growing community of sellers, offers more than ten million items for
sale. Half.com can be reached at www.half.com.
CONTACT: Porter Novelli, Los Angeles
Emily Scherberth, 310/444-7017
Laura Gallardo, 310/444-7043 URL: http://www.businesswire.comBUSINESS WIRE, 17th April 2001