Moscow, December 14, 2000. According to the results of the "Company of the Year 2000" competition organized by the Kompaniya magazine, the MTU-Inform Group was selected an "ISP of the Year." The ceremony honoring winners of this National Prize in business took place in Mariott Grand Hotel, Moscow, on December 13.

MTU-Inform became an ISP in 1997. Now the Company provides network access via dedicated lines, as well as Web-server hosting and managing services. Internet access via dial-up lines is provided by the special enterprise MTU-Intel that is a member of the MTU-Inform Group.

MTU-Inform retains leading positions on the market due to high quality of its services, affordable prices and its intention to ensure maximum convenience for customers.

* - High quality of the MTU-Inform Group services is explained by the largest modem stock in the country (more than 3000 of connection lines). The MTU-Inform Group is also a largest commercial telephone communications operator in Moscow. Its capabilities in installing new modem lines required for the growing number of users are practically unlimited. In addition, the quality of signal transmission is high because the company uses its own backbone IP-over-SDH network "MTU-Inform" with the 155 Mbps throughput and because of high-bandwidth channels for traffic exchange with all leading ISPs in Russia. The throughput of international MTU-Inform channels is 34 Mbps.

MTU-Inform is making every effort to improve customer services. For example, different connection techniques and Internet dial-up access payment methods have been developed. Customers may select payment method which is most convenient to them: payments in the MTU-Inform office, GUTA-MGTS offices, Avtobank divisions, Alfa-Bank, Sberbank, Pervoe OVK Bank, payments by phone and through the Internet. In April 1999, MTU-Inform became the first provider in Moscow to issue Internet-cards. These cards are used to register Internet access and to replenish personal account. Since May 2000, Internet-cards are also used for access to Internet telephony services. From the start of this project, the MTU-Inform customers may call numbers in any part of the globe, and the rates for such calls are much lower than those for conventional long-distance and international phone calls. To the present day, more than 1 million of Internet-cards have been sold by the MTU-Inform Group.

In 2000, after special equipment of new office spaces according to international standards, the MTU-Inform Group introduced connection and hosting services offered in its Technical Center for customer Web-servers. MTU-Inform provides Internet connection for the Yandex Search System developed by CompTek International, for the Internet Resource Catalog List.ru by RK-Audit as well as for other informational resources.

Another direction of MTU-Inform activities is its support of social programs. As an example, during implementation of the joint project "Educational Internet in Moscow" in collaboration with the Moscow Educational Committee more than 1000 Moscow educational institutions were connected to the Internet.

"To become an ISP of the Year is a great honor to us. Indeed, we worked hard to become the best," says Said Alimbekov, MTU-Inform general director. "Besides that, this is a serious responsibility. We shall do our best to maintain high quality of our services and to make new services available to our customers."

* - figures given are valid for year 2000.