Press Release

Netscape Announces Major Web Server Upgrade With Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 Now Available

Popular Web Server Led in GartnerGroup Market Share Survey, Voted PC Magazine Best of 1998, and Running On Digex, E*Trade, Lycos and Netscape Web Sites

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. (January 11, 1999) - Netscape Communications Corporation (NASDAQ: NSCP) today announced Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 software, a major upgrade of Netscape's market-leading web server software. Available now, Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 is high-performance, highly scalable web server software for deploying the largest-scale web sites. The new product offers the enterprise-class reliability, performance, dynamic content creation, and central administration features that enterprises need to compete as Enterprise Service Providers (ESPs) in the Net Economy.

As a result, Netscape Enterprise Server was voted Best of 1998 by PC Magazine and is being used by some of the largest e-commerce, Internet Service Provider (ISP) and portal web sites on the Internet including Digex, Excite, E*Trade, Lycos and Netscape Netcenter. The new Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 builds on Netscape's commanding lead in the web server software market. According to GartnerGroup's October 1998 survey of web server usage on public web sites, 66.8 percent of Fortune 100 public sites are running Netscape software, compared to Microsoft IIS at 16.8 percent and Apache at 9.4 percent.

"Netscape Enterprise Server is highly scalable and reliable web server software that enables organizations to build mission-critical Internet sites that help transform their business from a traditional company with brick-and-mortar assets to an Internet business as company.com," said Maneesh Dhir, vice president and general manager of the Netscape Application Platform and Managed Content division. "The product extends Netscape's strong web server software leadership with new fail-over, automatic recovery and dynamic log rotation capabilities as well as dramatically enhanced performance."

"Digex has created a rapidly growing business hosting and managing complex web sites and web-enabled applications for leading companies such as Nike and Anheuser-Busch," said Bobby Patrick, vice president at Digex. "To successfully deploy this service, Digex is currently using Netscape Enterprise Server to run hundreds of scalable web servers for our customers."

"Excite is among the top 10 most visited web sites on the Internet according to Media Metrix," said Jon Prall, vice president, operations at Excite, Inc. "We currently rely on Netscape Enterprise Server to provide the scalability, reliability, security and content management features Excite needs to run our fast-growing Portal service."

"We use Netscape Application Server and Netscape Enterprise Server running to provide the scalability and reliability we need to support more than 500,000 users making tens of thousands of transactions per day," said Debra Chrapaty, chief information officer at E*Trade. "Netscape Enterprise Server is an integral part of our infrastructure and we plan to upgrade to version 3.6 very soon."

"Traffic to Netscape Netcenter has grown dramatically in the last six months with more than 10 million members currently registered to Netcenter," said Mark Worsey, vice president of web site Operations and Infrastructure at Netscape. "We have upgraded Netscape Netcenter to run Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 because the product has the enormous improvements in scalability, reliability, administration, and dynamic content creation we need to handle the load."

By supporting multiple platforms, databases and document types, Netscape Enterprise Server leverages customers' existing investments in hardware, software, databases, applications and document formats.

Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 includes many new features such as:

  • Bullet-Proof Reliability and Availability - Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 includes support for multiple processes and process monitors to make sites highly available. If a web application crashes, only one of the web server processes will go down - while the remaining processes provide fail-over to keep the web site available to customers. Server monitors then automatically re-start the failed process without intervention by a network administrator. In addition, Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 features a new dynamic log rotation feature so that administrators can rotate server logs without shutting down the server, thus enhancing the ability to keep the web site highly available.

  • Enterprise Performance and Scalability - Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 has an advanced web server engine that is optimized to meet the deployment needs of busy sites. In recent tests on Netscape Netcenter, the new product was able to handle an approximately 800 percent higher load than older version running on a similar computer when accessing web applications written using the NSAPI.

  • Lightning-Fast Access to Dynamic Content - Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 provides unmatched performance in serving dynamic content, dramatically accelerated processing times and increased ability to process heavy loads. For rapid access to web content and applications, Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 features enhanced access to web applications written with the Netscape Application Programming Interface (NSAPI) and the Common Gateway Interface (CGI). The product includes a new CGI engine to accelerate performance by up to 1500 percent as compared to earlier versions running on a computer with four central processing units (CPU). In addition security performance is improved by support for secure sockets layer (SSL) hardware accelerators to provide fast access to secure sites.

  • Comprehensive Web Server Management - A broad set of management tools help reduce the cost of managing and maintaining a web site. Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 supports Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) versions 1 and 2 for standards-based remote monitoring capabilities from a variety of popular network management systems, including HP's OpenView, Tivoli/IBM's TME, BMC's Patrol, CA's UniCenter and Sun Solstice.

  • Centralized Administration - The product comes bundled with Netscape Directory Server software to provide network administrators with a single place to manage shared resources such as users and groups across the enterprise. The product also enables delegated administration, or the ability to selectively delegate particular administrative tasks to certain individuals. In addition, Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 enables administrators to manage remote servers more easily by treating multiple servers as one cluster. Administrators can start or stop remote servers or update remote configuration files simultaneously in a fraction of the time required to administer each individual server.

  • Rapid Database Application Development - Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 makes it fast and easy to build dynamic web applications that access data stored in databases. The product adds support for Servlets to the existing Netscape LiveWire support for server-side JavaScript, traditional server extensions such as CGI and NSAPI, and native database connectivity to information stored in an Oracle, Informix, IBM DB2, Sybase or ODBC-based databases.

    Netscape Enterprise Server is part of Netscape's E-Commerce infrastructure for ESPs competing in the Net Economy where high performance, scalability, 24x7 reliability and strong security features that extend outside the enterprise are critical for success. Netscape's infrastructure includes Netscape Enterprise Server, Netscape Application Server, Netscape Directory Server, and others. Netscape Application Server is one of the industry's fastest, most-scalable and reliable Internet application servers for deploying business-critical applications on the Internet and extranets. Using pre-built or custom extensions, customers can integrate applications deployed on Netscape Application Server with existing enterprise infrastructure. Netscape Directory Server software provides real-time directory and security services that enable centralized, low cost management of the myriad of Internet applications deployed by ESPs and independent software vendors.

    Netscape Enterprise Server 3.6 is available immediately from Netscape for the Microsoft Windows NT, Sun Solaris, HP-UX, IBM-AIX, SGI IRIX and Digital Unix operating environments. Pricing for the product begins at US$1,295 for a 50-publisher, unlimited access license and includes a copy of Netscape Directory Server.

    Netscape Communications Corporation is a leading provider of software and services for businesses that want to transform the way they create and keep customers in the emerging Net Economy. The company offers a full line of enterprise software solutions, professional services, and a leading Internet portal to help companies build, buy or outsource Internet applications that drive revenue growth, build customer loyalty, and create new levels of business efficiency. Traded on NASDAQ under the symbol NSCP, Netscape Communications Corporation is based in Mountain View, California.

    Additional information on Netscape Communications Corporation is available on the Internet at http://home.netscape.com, by sending email to info@netscape.com, or by calling corporate sales at 650/937-2555.

    Netscape, Netscape Navigator, Netscape Certificate Server, Netscape FastTrack Server, Netscape ONE, SuiteSpot and the Netscape N and Ship's Wheel logos are registered trademarks of Netscape Communications Corporation in the United States and other countries. Other Netscape logos, product names, and service names are also trademarks of Netscape Communications Corporation, which may be registered in other countries.