Partner Press Release
pcOrder Lends Expertise to Deliver RosettaNet IT Technical Dictionary Architecture

Founding Member of RosettaNet Helps the Organization to Improve Standards For IT Industry to Drive Efficiencies for Partners Across Vertical Supply Chains

For Release October 11, 2000

AUSTIN

pcOrder.com Inc. (NASDAQ:PCOR), a leading provider of business-to-business e-commerce solutions and transactive content for the information technology (IT) industry, and RosettaNet, a consortium dedicated to the development and deployment of standard electronic business interfaces to align the processes between supply chain partners on a global basis, today announced a collaboration to deliver RosettaNet's IT Technical Dictionary (ITTD) to partners in the upcoming months. By establishing a sequence of IT product descriptions, pcOrder has worked with RosettaNet to develop a standard e-commerce language that describes data that is most useful when purchasing a product.

Before RosettaNet, the format of product data differed among all vendors, making the exchange of information difficult because trading partners communicated information on one product, organized in several, incompatible formats. These newly developed RosettaNet Technical Dictionaries provide a framework for partner communication, similar to the vocabulary and grammar rules of any language.

As one of the founding members of RosettaNet, pcOrder offers its expertise in creating IT product data catalogs to help develop the RosettaNet ITTD in a concise, standardized format for the entire demand chain, or the trading partners a company uses to sell its product to end consumers. pcOrder has participated in the continued development of the dictionaries that describe individual parts used to build a computer, such as a hard drive or processor, as well as the finished computer itself.

pcOrder dedicated full-time staff to help RosettaNet develop the new ITTD architecture, improving interoperability, implementation and content, to help drive the industry towards the adoption of RosettaNet standards.

"By providing businesses with standardized technical dictionaries for product data, RosettaNet opens lines of communication and offers great opportunity for buyers and sellers of today's technologies," said Jennifer Hamilton, CEO of RosettaNet. "pcOrder's expertise in IT product data aggregation and catalog development has been an invaluable resource to the organization as we revolutionize data management and dramatically improve flow of information through the demand chain."

pcOrder and RosettaNet have worked to ensure the compatibility of the RosettaNet EC Technical Dictionary (ECTD) and ITTD architectures to provide businesses with a single standardized dictionary format that is comprehensive and easy to use for both IT and EC businesses. pcOrder will continue to participate in the project by facilitating content updates that will give RosettaNet partners access to new data in upcoming months.

"pcOrder is committed to the development of data standards for the industry. These standards are critical for improving speed and uniformity for the entire demand chain," said Christy Jones, president and COO of pcOrder. "As a contributor to the ITTD development, we will help RosettaNet partners reduce costs, increase productivity and exchange in multiple trading-partner relationships through the adoption of RosettaNet standards."

About pcOrder.com
pcOrder is a leading provider of business-to-business software applications, content and related services that are designed to move the computer industry to the Web. pcOrder's tailored solutions are designed to enable industry participants to take advantage of the increasing adoption of e-commerce to automate sales and distribution functions. pcOrder's technology and services are designed to enable customers to lower their cost of sales and marketing, reduce inventory levels, and more efficiently interact with their business partners and customers.

To date, industry participants such as AltaVista Shopping, Compaq, CompuCom Systems, CompUSA, CMP Media, Hewlett-Packard, Ingram Micro, IBM, Inktomi, Nortel Networks, Quantum, Tech Data, and Yahoo!Shopping have adopted either pcOrder's software applications, content and related services or both as part of their overall e-commerce strategy. pcOrder is located at 5001 Plaza on the Lake, Austin, Texas 78746. Telephone: (512) 684-1100. Fax: (512) 684-1200. World Wide Web address: http://www.pcorder.com.

About RosettaNet
RosettaNet is an independent, self-funded, non-profit consortium dedicated to the development and deployment of standard electronic business interfaces to align the processes between supply chain partners on a global basis.

More than 300 companies representing over $1 trillion in annual information technology, electronic components and semiconductor manufacturing revenues currently participate in RosettaNet's standards development, strategy and implementation activities.