SAN FRANCISCO, CA, [April 10, 2000] – eGroups, Inc., (http://www.egroups.com), the most widely used email group communication platform, launched its merged service today, representing the completion of the November 1999 merger of eGroups and ONElist, Inc. This launch joins eGroups’ and ONElist’s members, technology and service, creating the leading provider of free, easy, email groups. This month, the international service will expand to 14 languages. eGroups’ email group service has more than 14 million active members participating in over 600,000 email groups and exchanging over 2 billion email messages per month.

“Last November, we brought together the two leaders in email group communications. Our new service combines the best elements of eGroups and ONElist. Our members can easily create, join and manage online email groups focused on a wide range of personal and small business interests,” said Michael Klein, Chief Executive Officer of eGroups.

The new site incorporates member input from extensive usability testing and member research. eGroups conducted comparative feature tests among original eGroups and ONElist members to identify ease-of-use enhancements. Using eGroups’ service, the company also formed an email discussion group to secure member input on the new design. The engineers moderated vibrant discussions and reviewed thousands of emails from members.

“Our service enabled the product team to stay close to customers through out the development process,” said Klein. “Using our email groups to share their feedback, customers had a real voice in the product design.”

The new service features hundreds of usability enhancements to enrich the email group experience. Some highlights include:

• Faster performance and more storage space: The improved site is faster and more responsive. Additionally, every group has 20MB of file sharing space for photos, MP3s, spreadsheets and any other group documents.
• Expanded Help System: Now the help system is quicker and easier for members. It is context-sensitive and searchable by key word.
• More categories: eGroups has partnered with the Open Directory Project to provide comprehensive category choices for classifying groups. Now it’s easier for members to find and join email groups on topics of interest and moderators can categorize their groups using a universally accepted classification system. With the eGroups service, members communicate with each other using a single group email address. Messages are delivered directly to members’ email inboxes, allowing them to read and reply at their own convenience. Email archives store past member communications for easy Web-based retrieval. Each group also has their own group calendar, private chat room, and group polling features.

About eGroups, Inc.

eGroups, Inc. is the most widely used group communications platform on the Internet. The eGroups service enables members to easily create, join, and manage email group focused on personal and small business interests. Complementing the core service is a set of integrated web-based group communications features such as group calendar, file sharing, polling and email archives. The Company serves more than 14 million members and hosts 600,000 active email groups exchanging 2 billion emails per month. The eGroups Web site was ranked #13 among  Web Services companies by Media Metrix in February 2000. By aggregating members who are segmented into interest-based groups, eGroups offers advertisers and direct marketers a broad audience as well as a range of highly targeted advertising opportunities. In addition, the Company has 2.5 million subscriptions from its members for its permission-based direct marketing programs. eGroups is based in San Francisco and Redwood City, California. For more information, please visit http://www.egroups.com.