Executive Suite Deployment: Office Suite Group selects M5 for Two New Locations

[Nov.20, 2002]

M5, a New York-based telecom provider, announced the deployment of their service at Office Suite Group's (OSG) new 90 John Street and Galleria location (115 East 57th Street). M5 was chosen to provide the fast-growing Manhattan executive office suite company (formerly known as KickstartUSA) with state-of-the art phone system functionality, Cisco IP phones, local and long-distance service and high-speed Internet access. M5, who delivers voice and data services remotely via a private high-speed network, eliminated OSG's need to purchase phone systems for their new centers and provided them with a telecommunications infrastructure that delivers their tenants superior features and service.

As an M5 customer, OSG now offers their tenants state-of-the-art phone features normally reserved for large organizations. Tenants enjoy off-net forwarding, multi-party conference calling on every phone and, upon request, specialty features such as ACD and call-center functionality. OSG is also the only office suite company in New York City that offers its tenants off-site phones. By plugging these phones into any broadband connection, users can receive and place calls (internal and external) as if they were working at their office desk. This feature allows a tenant to work from home or any remote location while having their work phone at their side. However, OSG tenant Alan Baron is most excited about the not-so-fancy features available to him. "It's the ability to park calls and the use of Caller ID which I find most useful. It is these little tools that make my life easier."

OSG has also benefited operationally from the simplicity of M5's Managed Telecom Service. The high tenant turnover of office suite firms (setup, moves, adds and changes) can be expensive to support. With M5, OSG can activate new clients in minutes without any technical assistance. Meanwhile, M5 actively monitors OSG's phone system and can support most user issues without an engineer leaving his or her seat. This costly burden of tenant support has been reduced significantly.

From a financial perspective, M5's tenant-shared telecom service offers significant advantages. In addition to eliminating the upfront expense of two large phone systems, and providing OSG access to bulk calling rates, M5 provides OSG the ability to scale its telecom service up and down in increments not available with traditional telephone solutions. "M5 prevented us from having to invest in expensive telecom infrastructure before launching these new centers." notes OSG Corporate Facilities Manager Jessica Handy, "The real beauty of the M5 solution is the flexible cost structure that protects OSG financially over time. Telecom expenses only occur when telecom revenue is generated."

M5's Managed Telecom Service also provides Office Suite Group with benefits such as free calling between new OSG facilities and the ability to let customers take their phone number with them if and when they leave the office center. OSG is using this as another way to differentiate their company in the competitive executive suite market.

About M5

M5 is a leader in the rapidly emerging market of Managed Telecom Service. Serving over 125 customers throughout New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, M5 has won awards and analyst praise for their high-level of service, and profitable model that has pushed out the real deployment of this technology faster than other companies. Incorporated in May 2000, M5 is a privately funded outsourced communications provider serving corporate customers. The M5 management team co-founded and built Interport Communications, one of the first and eventually largest commercial ISPs in NYC, before selling it to RCN in 1998. M5's strategic industry partners include Cisco, AboveNet, Verizon, VocalData and Focal Communications.

Fully funded and not venture-backed, M5 is not pushed to take risks for aggressive market share growth. M5 needs no additional capital and runs current operations at a profit. Replicating the Interport model, M5 grows the company one happy customer at a time. Extensive demand for M5 services elevated M5 to financial stability fast. This is your best guarantee - a profitable company is a safe bet.