"Business customers have been very vocal about their frustration with the lack of an integrated, cost-effective and productive solution for creating e-business Web sites," said Bernard Desarnauts, vice president of product management and marketing at NetObjects. "NetObjects Fusion 4.0 was designed to address this requirement, and unlike Web site building products aimed at desktop productivity or high-end media designers, NetObjects Fusion provides the fastest, easiest way to build sophisticated business Web sites."

From Billboards to e-business Sites
Today's businesses need more than just an on-line presence, they need an "e-business site" or a place where customers, employees, suppliers and distributors can reach, interact and transact with the business. e-business sites represent a convergence of publishing, electronic commerce and application functionality and enable businesses to leverage the potential of the Internet. However, it is still too difficult for most business users to build content-rich sites that include dynamic data and business logic as well as facilitate e-commerce. According to a study released by the analyst firm Yankee Group, the majority of small and medium businesses have not strategically embraced the Internet as a business tool due to the lack of easy to use, productive solutions that help them get started and scale with their needs. NetObjects with its partners helps fill this void.

"Not only is NetObjects Fusion easy to use and robust, it has enabled me to grow and develop my site building skills at a rapid pace," said Toni Skorusa of Information Processing Group Operating Systems at NationsBank. "From powerful site management capabilities to the ability to visually implement high-end technologies, version 4.0 reaffirms NetObjects' commitment to producing a valuable product for business users."

Delivering e-Business Sites in a Box- Key New Features and Functionality
NetObjects Fusion 4.0 is an open, extensible platform for creating e-business Web sites. The product now provides unparalleled visual power and flexibility thanks to a robust, new Java-based component architecture. The new component architecture taps the full potential of the Java (NASDAQ: SUNW) platform, and enables the creation of components that extend the power of NetObjects Fusion by providing seamless integration with several leading third-party products and technologies. In version 4.0, NetObjects provides a variety of new components such as connectors to Allaire ColdFusion and iCat Commerce Online, and expects more components to be available from partners like IBM WebSphere (NYSE: IBM), INTERSHOP, and other third parties.

In addition to the new components, NetObjects Fusion 4.0 includes several user-requested enhancements to the trademark ease-of-use, WYSIWYG design and robust site-management capabilities of earlier versions.

e-Publishing
NetObjects Fusion 4.0 facilitates e-publishing or the distribution of information on the Web. Site builders can simply drag-and-drop powerful components to connect to standard ODBC compliant databases including Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL), IBM DB2, Informix (NASDAQ: IFMX) and publish dynamically generated data. Version 4.0 allows users to easily convert documents (including those from Microsoft Office) into an HTML format and place them anywhere on a page. Also new to version 4.0, is pinpoint control over HTML with support for cascading style sheet positioning (CSSP) and layers. The product now includes incremental publish capabilities for quick page or section updates and management. To offer customers a variety of options for a creative look and feel, fifty brand-new SiteStyles are included with NetObjects Fusion 4.0.

e-Applications
NetObjects Fusion 4.0 provides a powerful feature-set to add application functionality to Web sites. The product includes components to query and display data using the most popular application server platforms including, Allaire ColdFusion, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) Active Server Pages and Lotus Domino. Site builders can use these components and work with intuitive wizards to incorporate dynamically generated data and other sophisticated functionality into their sites with just a few mouse clicks. The product also includes components that connect to Lotus eSuite DevPack, a set of business productivity Java applets that help site builders quickly turn static Web pages into robust interactive applications which provide easy access to and presentation of enterprise data. The eSuite DevPack applets include a spreadsheet, word processor, chart, project schedule and presentation graphics.

e-Commerce
NetObjects has partnered with iCat to provide site-builders an out-of-the-box, drag-and-drop solution that will turn a Web site into a compelling Web store in a matter of minutes. A set of NetObjects Fusion components for iCat Commerce Online ships with the product, and provides site-builders an easy, efficient and cost-effective solution for creating Web-based storefronts. Using an interactive wizard, site-builders can connect to iCat Commerce Online, a hosted solution that offers several unique features such as the ability to sell up to 3000 different items, full on-line ordering capabilities, shopping cart functionality with several payment options, automatic tax and shipping charge calculations, and extensive reporting.

NetObjects Fusion 4.0 also includes components that connect to HotMedia , IBM's popular rich media technology for the Web. These components allow NetObjects Fusion users to add dynamic multimedia content including 3D objects, zoomable images, and more, to their e-business Web sites.

NetObjects Fusion 4.0 to Include Allaire Homesite 4.0, NetStudio 1.0.1 and IBM HotMedia
NetObjects Fusion 4.0 also offers integrated solutions with several leading Web products and technologies that are included with the product. Site builders can use Allaire Homesite to hand-code HTML pages, which can be integrated into sites built with version 4.0. NetStudio, an intuitive image editor, designed for business users, provides powerful image editing capabilities, while IBM's HotMedia toolkit allows site builders to author multiple types of multimedia experiences.

Trial versions of the best-of-breed Web script editor NetObjects ScriptBuilder™ 3.0, the popular application server Allaire ColdFusion and Live Picture's panorama imaging product PhotoVista are also bundled with NetObjects Fusion 4.0.

Pricing and Availability
NetObjects Fusion 4.0 will be available by January 1999 at an estimated street price of $299.95. Customers who purchased NetObjects Fusion 3.0 between December 1- December 31, 1998 can receive a free upgrade to Version 4.0. Customers who purchased NetObjects Fusion 3.0 before December 1, 1998 can receive an upgrade for $99.95. NetObjects will also continue to offer a $100 competitive upgrade rebate for those customers who own competitive Web authoring products.