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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Citibank Taps Obongo to Provide "Single-Click" E-Commerce Experience First Financial Services Company to Offer Faster, Easier Service through Obongo's Innovative Personalized ToolbarNew York, NY — Citibank today introduced a new, free downloadable toolbar that will make it easier and faster to surf and shop the Internet by providing single-click login, registration, form filling, searching and comparison shopping. It also allows the user to filter or forward e-mail. The toolbar, powered by Obongo, is server-based so, unlike passwords and favorite sites stored on a local PC, a user of the Citibank Toolbar can access his or her personal toolbar from any computer with Internet access. It is designed to be extremely secure, using multi-layer encryption to keep a Web surfer's information protected. "The Internet is a tremendous resource for consumers," said Steven J. Freiberg, President and CEO of Citi Cards in North America, "but it needs to be more consumer friendly for them to take full advantage of it. They want to be able to conduct their online shopping and other activities in a fast, easy, and secure manner and the new Citibank Toolbar provides a tool to do just that. It's an innovative step closer to maximizing the potential of the Internet." This is the latest in a series of recent announcements which demonstrates Citigroup's commitment to providing a comprehensive suite of online consumer financial products and services, accessible anywhere, on any device, at any time, in a secure and private manner, as well as Citigroup's intent to become a major player in facilitating on-line consumer payments. After taking less than a minute to download, the Citibank Toolbar appears at the bottom of the user's Web browser. The toolbar then allows the user unprecedented control over his or her Internet experience, including the ability to access the toolbar from anywhere there is an Internet connection. Additionally, the toolbar can reflect personal preferences and priorities through a variety of set-up options that allow for "customization", including:
The Citibank Toolbar will also include special functions to allow easy access to Citigroup and Citibank financial products and services. "We are delighted that the largest financial services company in the world has chosen our technology to enhance their customers' e-commerce experience," said John Hunt, CEO of Obongo Inc. "We expect scores of other financial institutions to follow Citibank's lead in providing millions of customers with Obongo's platform and thus an unsurpassed ability to get what they want quickly and easily at the best possible price". A recent report by Forrester Research on e-commerce predicts that U.S. online sales will jump from $490 billion in 1999 to $3.2 trillion by 2004. "Consumers are migrating to the Internet, and we've been there to serve them with the latest advances in technology," added Antony Jenkins, chief operating officer, Citigroup's Internet payment services. "It has always been important to us to provide our customers privacy, safety and value when shopping online. Our new Citibank Toolbar takes this promise one step further by providing faster and easier access - not only as it relates to shopping - but to other online products and services as well." Consumers can download the free Citibank Toolbar by visiting www.citibanktoolbar.com. It supports Netscape 4.06+, Internet Explorer 4.0+ and AOL 4.0 and 5.0.
# # # Citibank is a member of Citigroup, a premier financial services company providing some 100 million consumers, corporations, governments and institutions in 100 countries with a broad range of financial products and services, including consumer banking and credit, corporate and investment banking, insurance, securities brokerage and asset management. The 1998 merger of Citicorp and Travelers Group brought together such brand names as Citibank, Travelers, Salomon Smith Barney, CitiFinancial, and Primerica under Citigroup's trademark red umbrella. Additional information may be found at www.citigroup.com. Obongo, Inc. is a pre-IPO company headquartered in Redwood City, California (Silicon Valley) with offices in New York, London and Bombay. Since launching its first product, the Obongo bar for the PC in March 2000, Obongo Inc. has already created a global presence with a fast-growing customer base in 161 countries. The Obongo bar recently received ZDNet's highest five-star rating. Future versions of the product will provide the current features, and others from cell phones, PDAs and other Internet access devices. Obongo's technology team comes from Microsoft, Symantec, WebEx, LSI Logic, Sun and Oracle, while the commercial team comes from PWC, CSFB, Procter & Gamble, Palm, Monitor and McKinsey. The company operates an ASP (application service provider). It provides a turnkey hosted service to partners such as financial and telecom companies to strengthen their relationships with their customers by providing them with Obongo services under their own brand. Additional information is available at www.obongo.com.
Contacts:
Taulene Ayoub, Obongo |