SAN DIEGO and NEW YORK, May 25 /PRNewswire/ -- Gateway (NYSE: GTW) and
Consumer Financial Network (CFN), a leading provider of employee benefit, HR
and life planning portal solutions to Fortune 1000 companies and subsidiary of
iXL Enterprises (Nasdaq: IIXL), today announced an agreement in principle to
jointly market PCs, Internet access, financing, training and other PC-related
products and services to corporations wishing to provide their employees with
Internet-based services in both the office and at home. In addition, the
companies announced a planned $150 million equity investment by Gateway in
CFN, subject to regulatory approval.
"Employer PC programs have the potential to change the way computers,
Internet service and related products and services are sold, and we are
committed to becoming a major player in that segment," said Jeff Weitzen,
Gateway president and chief executive officer. "We have the hardware,
software, peripherals, training and service to enable any corporation's
employees to get the most out of the Internet. As the first U.S. company to
fully deploy an employee PC program ourselves, we believe we're uniquely
qualified to provide the best overall value in this space."
According to industry analysts, the market for corporate portal products
and services will amount to $14 billion by 2002. Currently, CFN provides
78 Fortune 500 companies with a range of HR and employee-centric benefit
solutions delivered via PCs and custom-built Internet portals.
"Employers are looking for ways to provide value to their best employees,
and employer-subsidized PC programs are becoming an increasingly important way
to empower their workforces," said Rishi Sood, Principal Analyst for Vertical
Markets at Gartner Group. "This is a new-model benefit that is becoming more
central to companies' retention and workforce training strategies. We expect
to see the expansion of this practice as employers recognize the value of
having a direct, efficient link to their workers and workers realize the value
of easier access to HR and benefit programs."
"Gateway's investment underscores the shared vision we have for CFN as the
market leader in the growing business-to-employee space," said Bert Ellis,
Chairman and CEO of iXL Enterprises. "Today's announcement puts both CFN and
iXL in a stronger financial position than ever before, and as CFN asserts its
position in the sector, we expect it to provide greater value to iXL's
shareholders."
Cathleen Raffaeli, president and COO of CFN, added, "We expect
employer-to-employee PC fringe benefit programs to move from the exception to
the rule as more and more companies realize the efficiencies and advantages of
portal-based delivery of HR services, benefit selection and health and wealth
tools and products. This space is rapidly evolving into a multi-billion
dollar marketplace and we expect that our suite of CFN integrated solutions,
delivered on Gateway hardware, will quickly become the industry's gold
standard."
The Gateway investment, on top of a more than $130 million capital
infusion completed in March from other investors, would effectively reduce
iXL's majority ownership in CFN to a minority interest upon completion of the
deal. iXL, however, will remain CFN's largest single shareholder at
48.5 percent.
About Gateway
Gateway (NYSE: GTW), a Fortune 250 company founded in 1985, focuses on
building lifelong relationships with consumers and businesses through complete
technology personalization. Gateway ranked number one in U.S. consumer PC
revenue in 1999 (1) and was rated among the top ten best corporate reputations
in America according to a survey conducted in August of 1999 by Harris
Interactive and the Reputation Institute and published in The Wall Street
Journal. Gateway employees worldwide provide clients with services and
built-to-order computers that consistently win top awards from leading
industry publications. Gateway had total global revenue of $8.65 billion in
1999 and shipped 4.68 million systems. For more information, visit our Web
site at http://www.gateway.com.
About Consumer Financial Network
CFN's goal is to build the premiere portal for consumer financial and
health needs at work and at home. For corporations, CFN offers a suite of
products that give companies a highly flexible and rapidly deployable employee
and manager self-service solution for benefits and HR policies. For
consumers, CFN offers one destination for learning about, applying and
transacting for financial services.
CFN created and launched YouDecide.com (http://www.youdecide.com), a
sophisticated e-commerce web site for marketing financial services and related
benefits to individual consumers over the Internet, supported by assistance
from trained consumer advisors, available through email and by phone.
In October 1999, CFN acquired iExpert, the most advanced technology for
personalizing and managing information on benefits and human resource
information over the Web. By drawing on a vast library of HR and benefit
information, and tying this information to individual employee
characteristics, iExpert provides the ability to generate personalized
information to the individual employee level.
About iXL Enterprises, Inc.
iXL Enterprises, Inc. (Nasdaq: IIXL) is the parent company of iXL, Inc.,
iXL Ventures and the Consumer Financial Network(TM). iXL helps businesses
identify how the Internet can be used to their competitive advantage and uses
its expertise in creative design and systems engineering to design, develop
and deploy advanced e-business applications and solutions. iXL Enterprises,
Inc. has more than 20 offices in the United States, Europe, Japan and Latin
America. For more information, visit http://www.ixl.com.
Forward Looking Statements
Statements made in this release that state the Companies' or managements'
beliefs or expectations and which are not historical facts or which apply
prospectively are forward-looking statements. It is important to note that
the Companies' actual results could differ materially from those contained in
or implied by such forward looking statements. Additional information
concerning factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from
those in the forward looking statements is contained from time to time in the
Companies' SEC filings including but not limited to the 10-K and subsequent
10-Q's. Copies of those filings are available from the Companies and the SEC.
SOURCE Gateway
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Related links:
http://www.gateway.com
CONTACT:
Investor Contacts, Marlys Johnson of Gateway
Investor Relations, 605-232-2709, marlys.johnson@gateway.com; or
Barbara Domingo of iXL Enterprises, Inc., 404-479-7053,
bdomingo@ixl.com; or Media Contacts, John W. Spelich of Gateway
Corporate Communications, 858-799-2657, john.spelich@gateway.com;
or Matthew Conroy of Stanton Crenshaw Communications for iXL,
212-780-1900 ext. 539, matt@stanton-crenshaw.com; or Steve Foley
of CFN, 212-366-4600, sfoley@cfn.com
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