Home Director Previews Its Expanded Line of HomeNetworking Systems Promising Greater Choice to...

Business Editors/High Tech Writers

International Builders Show

DALLAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 14, 2000

Newly Designed Product Planned For Introduction Later This Year

Home Director, Inc., the recently launched spin-off from IBM, today previewed the first expansion

The new product, to be known as the Network Connection Center, complements Home Director's existing line of products and offers customers a home networking alternative suitable for larger homes and home-based businesses.

Driving the company's focus on delivering Internet sharing, entertainment, education and home office capabilities to consumers, the Home Director family of Connection Center products enables homes for the promise of broadband services. With a line of products that include features ranging from advanced telephony and video systems to fast 100Mb Ethernet connectivity within the home, the forthcoming product adds to Home Director's leadership position in the home networking category.

"Since entering the home networking marketplace in 1998, Home Director has been dedicated to delivering the best available solutions to its customers," said Mary Walker, president and CEO of Home Director. "With the emergence of high speed Internet and broadband technologies we needed to evolve our product line to better deliver their benefits to a broader range of homeowners and the new Network Connection Center promises to do just that."

The Network Connection Center takes the best features of Home Director's current line of products and expands them to meet the needs of more homeowners than ever before. Following extensive input from its network of Authorized Home Systems Integrators and new home builders, Home Director has designed the new Network Connection Center for more efficient cable management in a larger home. The company also worked closely with service providers and technology companies, to better understand the emerging broadband and digital access devices that further enhance the capabilities of a home network. With the input that it received from these communities, Home Director developed a product that not only delivers on the power of today's technologies, but matches its existing Home Network Connection Center's flexibility for handling emerging technologies.

Addressing the needs of an expanded audience, Home Director created the Network Connection Center to deliver the best possible home networking solution to the previously untapped markets of larger homes and home-based businesses. Depending on the configuration, the Network Connection Center includes the capability of handling up to 16 incoming telephone lines going to 128 wall jacks. To distribute data throughout a large home or small office, the Network Connection Center can be configured to include an eight port (expandable) Ethernet hub. For entertainment, the product matches the existing line of Home Network Connection Centers in distributing up to 16 incoming video signals from sources including Cable TV, satellite, security cameras and DVD or VCR's to any television in the home.

In addition to these features being available today, all of the Connection Centers have the ability to incorporate emerging technologies such as Cable and DSL modems as well as residential gateways and control systems when they are available. By delivering these systems today, Home Director is ensuring that new homes are ready for the future.

The Network Connection Center is the first new product to be demonstrated by Home Director since it separated from IBM. As an independent company, Home Director is better able to react quickly to changes in market conditions and build the relationships necessary to deliver on the promise of a digital world. The flexible design of its product line, and the entrepreneurial nature of Home Director, provide a platform within which technology partners and service providers can develop and deliver integrated network components that meet consumers needs more efficiently than before.

Understanding the Marketplace

Since it first entered the market in the fall of 1998, Home Director has been determined to lead the home networking marketplace in delivering products that meet the needs of consumers, installers and builders alike. As this market has evolved, and new technologies have emerged, Home Director has seen the need to evolve its products to meet market conditions.

Consumers - Today's consumers have grown up in the technology age and recognize that their homes need to be able to take advantage of the benefits that it delivers. Internet connectivity, digital satellite or cable television, multiple telephone lines into the home and advanced home theatre systems are just a few of the things that they are demanding. The key to meeting these needs is delivering a solution that addresses these technologies, but also delivers on the promise of emerging ones, such as DSL and cable modems and residential gateways, that will be available tomorrow. The Home Director solution is designed to meet these expectations.

Builders - As consumers become more technology savvy, they are demanding that their homes include a complete technology infrastructure. Over the past two years builders have seen a dramatic increase in the demand for advanced wiring systems for telephones, video and computer networking as well as home entertainment, security and automated lighting systems. Home Director has focused its efforts on the new home construction industry and has developed in-house expertise on the building process and an understanding of builders' needs both logistically and technically. In doing this, Home Director has become a partner to the industry.

Integrators - The key to Home Director's success in the new home construction industry was its development of the Authorized Home Systems Integrator program. These business partners are local experts, trained and authorized by Home Director to install, service and support their home networking systems. By creating this standardized program, both consumers and builders have access to professionals they can count on.

The Home Networking Market

Cahners In-Stat Group, Scottsdale, AZ, projects that the home networking market will grow 60%, to $1.4 billion by 2003. Meanwhile, the Yankee Group, Boston, says that by 2003, there will be 10 million internally networked U.S. homes.

In-Stat also reports that the home networking market grew sequentially by 18% in the third quarter of 1999, and is expected to reach $137 million in end user sales by the end of 1999.

The demand for Web access, as well as the growth of high-speed connections to pipe the Internet into homes, are fueling home networking growth. For example, more than 27.3 million users worldwide are expected to use digital subscriber lines (DSL) by 2003, up from 70,000 in 1998, according to Framingham, MA-based International Data Corp.

Also driving growth are the large number of new housing starts, which now frequently offer so-called structured wiring -- a combination of telephone, video and computer wiring types that work in conjunction to deliver data throughout a home. By 2001, 20% of new single-family housing starts - or 222,000 homes - will feature this type of wiring, according to Dallas-based Parks Associates.

About Home Director

Based in Morrisville, NC, Home Director, Inc. was launched in January of 2000 as an independent, entrepreneurial spin-off of the former IBM Home Networking Solutions unit. As a market leader in the home networking industry, Home Director has built a successful business focusing on both leading edge technologies and strategic channel development. Home Director products are available across the United States and Canada through a network of Authorized Home Systems Integrators (AHSI's). To locate an AHSI, visit the Home Director web site at www.ibm.com/homedirector or call toll free 1-800-426-7144.

For Home Director media inquiries, please contact Andrew Hayden, Director of Communications at 203-431-4588, or via email at haydena@us.ibm.com.

Home Director and "The Intelligent Home" are trademarks of Home Director, Inc. Home Director, Inc. is not an IBM company. IBM is a trademark of International Business Machines Corporation and is used under license. Other company, product and service names may be trademarks or service marks of others.