New ANS Service Will Provide Commercial Access to Internet

Elmsford, N.Y. -- June 6, 1991 -- ANS CO+RE Systems, Inc., today announced CO+RE Service*, a new service that will allow commercial  as well as research and education users to interconnect to the Internet through the ANS high speed computer networks. ANS CO+RE  Systems, Inc. is a newly formed taxable subsidiary of Advanced Network & Services, Inc.

"The new CO+RE Service will enable the private sector and the research and education community to interconnect with fewer restrictions via existing computer networks. This will help technology transfer, enhance productivity and promote the exchange of ideas across many disciplines," said Allan H. Weis, President and CEO of ANS.

To ensure the broad connectivity required to make the new service a success, a series of agreements are being entered into with other network service providers and private organizations. CO+RE Service's objectives are to expand connectivity, broaden access, and make the Internet a more useful and productive tool. Revenues from the provision of CO+RE Service, after covering associated expenses, will be used to enrich national networking infrastructure.

"The new service will not only enrich the network resources accessible to the research and education communities the National Science Foundation is charged to support, but will enable all network users to benefit from the infrastructure enhancements and accompanying economies of scale," said Steve Wolff, Director of the National Science Foundation's Division of Networking Communications Research and Infrastructure (DNCRI).

By broadening access to the Internet, CO+RE Service will further ANS's efforts to complement and support the concepts proposed in the National Research and Education Network (NREN) put forward by the Administration and Congress as a part of the High Performance Computing and Communications Program. The Internet is a collection of interconnected networks which serves research and education institutions and federal agencies.

"By strengthening and improving the ability of American business and industry to move information and to communicate, we strengthen and improve our economy," said Sen. Al Gore, D-TN, author of the High Performance Computing Act that would create a national high speed computer network, "Just as local roads provided invaluable access to the interstate highways, this new service will provide invaluable access to the Internet and eventually to the new national network. And, the national network will further encourage development of private networks connecting computer users in every sector of the economy. Investments by the federal and state governments will be made even more valuable."

CO+RE Service is the result of several months of detailed work between ANS and many of the midlevel networks.

"Without this service, researchers and educators had to use many different networks to reach the resources they needed to solve problems," said William Yundt, Executive Director of the Bay Area Regional Research Network (BARRNet). "A biochemist might need to call one number using a modem to search chemical abstracts, use a local college network to reach the university's library catalog and use a third network to get to databases on the human genome. With expanded commercial providers on the Internet, a single common network will increase that researcher's ability to find any information needed and focus on the research task at hand."

ANS CO+RE Systems, Inc. is a wholly owned taxable subsidiary of Advanced Network & Services, Inc. (ANS), a not-for-profit corporation. ANS provides computer network services to expand the interchange of information technology resources among academic, government and private sector users. ANS manages and operates the ANS network, a national computer network used by researchers, educators and staff in universities, federal laboratories and the private sector.

ANS was formed in 1990 by the IBM Corporation, MCI Communications Corporation and Merit Network, Inc. to help advance research and education.

For more information, contact: Kristin Mortensen (914) 789-5304.

*CO+RE is a service mark of ANS CO+RE Systems, Inc.