Verio Launches Business Management Tools

CENTENNIAL, Colo. -- Jan. 31, 2006 -- Verio Inc., a US-based subsidiary of NTT Communications Group and a leading provider of hosting and Internet services for small to midsized companies and partners, today announced the availability of its Verio Reseller Business Tools (RBT), a suite of tools designed to assist viaVerio(R) resellers with the management of their businesses. The new service will help to ease the burden of performing many billing and accounting, reporting and other tasks for value-added resellers, enabling them to focus on business growth and customer needs rather than administrative tasks.

Today's resellers find it increasingly difficult to manage growing customer lists and expanding functionality on their own Web sites, as well as on the sites of their Web hosting customers. By automating tasks, such as monthly billing and accounting, it is estimated that Verio's Reseller Business Tools can reduce the time required for resellers to bill customers to as little as one to two hours per month.

viaVerio reseller John Blood, president of Behold Learning, said he strives to maintain personal relationships with each of his customers, but the challenges of running a small business can sometimes put a strain on resources and priorities. "The biggest stumbling block for me as a small business owner is on the administrative side, like keeping up with invoices, the monthly billing cycle and managing customer accounts," said Blood. "With Verio's Reseller Business Tools suite I've been able to set up customer accounts in one place, and benefit from being to do automated billing, payments and provisioning of services all from one interface, instead of the three or four we previously needed. This is a tangible benefit to a business owner of any size."

Mark Sharkey, founder of the PrecisionPros.com Network, a viaVerio GoldPlus reseller, agrees that Verio's Reseller Business Tools will help to dramatically decrease the administrative requirements for his team to manage more than 400 customers. "We anticipate the time needed to perform our monthly invoicing tasks will be reduced by as much as 40 percent," said Sharkey. "By delivering the Reseller Business Tools suite, Verio has again met a critical need for VARs, and continues to demonstrate why the company's reseller program is so attractive and beneficial to companies like mine."

The functionality of RBT also ensures that users can better manage customer information by creating and managing customer groups for customized mailings and email promotions, and enable customers to update their own contact and billing information, and track trouble tickets. Additionally, RBT integrates with Intuit QuickBooks Pro for automatic synchronization with order, payment, refund, customer and product information, allowing resellers to streamline accounting processes and improve financial planning.

Verio's Reseller Business Tools suite features enable resellers to:

-- Simplify Order Processing. Resellers can now automate order processing, including opening and building out jobs, as well as adding discounts, promotions, discount schedules for limited or recurring offers and shipping and tax rates.

-- Optimize Product Catalog. With RBT, resellers can configure every item in their catalog for certain customer groups, including promotions, discounts, product bundles and add-on services. The product also enables them to easily manage product names, prices, SKUs and shipping weights.

-- Ease Credit Card Payments. Resellers can accept credit card payments using an existing shopping cart payment gateway.

-- Produce Financial Reports. Robust reporting functionality allows for fast database queries and creation of reports that will help summarize customer buying habits and order pricing trends in XML, HTML, CSV, LSV or Excel formats.

"As many hosting resellers' businesses begin to grow, they often encounter roadblocks along the way and find themselves struggling under the weight of managing customer information, billing and payment processes and other tasks which must be performed each and every month. The RBT offering is intended to relieve this burden and free up resellers time to focus on the business itself - not administrative tasks," said Jim Ciampaglio, director of reseller sales for Verio. "Verio's business is focused on the health of its resellers, and we want to enable the continued growth and effectiveness of our reseller partners. Products and services such as Reseller Business Tools help these partners deliver a more efficient, higher quality service to their own customers and business."

The viaVerio(R) Partner Program provides SME resellers with access to a variety of high-value hosting services, including hosting on a dedicated, shared, virtual private server or managed private server platform, in addition to a range of Internet services. Additionally, viaVerio(R) resellers receive volume discounts, private label opportunities, and technical, sales and marketing support based on program participation.

About Verio

Verio Inc. is a leading provider of hosting and Internet services for small and midmarket companies and partners worldwide, and is a wholly owned subsidiary of NTT America, US subsidiary of NTT Communications, which provides complementary global network access reaching over 200 countries worldwide. The company offers businesses a range of Internet services, including Web hosting, managed services and value-added professional service offerings. Verio supports its operations with highly reliable and scalable global infrastructure and systems including the NTT Communications Global IP Network, and provides business solutions to customers and partners in more than 146 countries. More information can be found at www.verio.com and www.ntt.com/index-e.html.