News release

Compaq's Entrepreneurial Business Tools Help Parson Group,
the Inc. 500 Fastest-Growing Private Company

In the high growth services market segment, technology partners are one of the keys to strong and sustained growth in a highly competitive industry. Parson Group, Inc. magazine's fastest growing private company in 2000, cited Compaq (NYSE: CPQ) as its technology partner in helping to achieve its phenomenal 27,992 percent growth over five years.

"Compaq has helped us earn the Inc. 500 award by its stability and reliability," said Maribeth Ward, vice president of Information Technology of Parson Group. "Our systems infrastructure needed to grow exponentially in order to support the revenue growth. Compaq hardware made that possible."

The Chicago-based professional services firm specializes in operational consulting in finance, accounting and business systems. In addition to 650 employees across 13 major U.S. markets, Parson Group, through CDW, a direct solutions provider, employs end-to-end Compaq solutions: "We use NT/SQL running on 20 Compaq ProLiant™ servers in our corporate office and 13 field offices," said Ward. "We use both Great Plains and Portera software applications on more than 100 Compaq desktops and laptops."

"Compaq is a trusted advisor that offers the best solutions for customers," said Robyn West, vice president of Small and Medium Business in Compaq North America. "We offered Parson Group innovative solutions scaled to fit their business model and technology products and services that protected their investment."

Compaq is the only manufacturer in a recent Technology Business Research (TBR) study to exhibit positive growth in customer satisfaction ratings for both first quarter 2001 and fourth quarter 2000 in the server market with its market-leading ProLiant servers. The study notes that, "A striking aspect of this quarter's analysis is the great distance at which Compaq has exceeded the competition for parts availability, scalability, server management, and overall hardware reliability" and in the consistency of its customers' satisfaction from quarter to quarter "while its competitors continue to show vulnerability to eroding customer satisfaction for the second consecutive quarter."

This study also noted that Compaq showed a marked improvement in satisfaction with replacement parts availability and has comparable satisfaction ratings with its nearest competitor for on-time reliable delivery. Compaq also scores very high—and ahead of all the competition—on hardware reliability, its traditional strength, illustrating Compaq's focus on customers' most important priority and its ability to improve in other areas without detracting from its core strength.

"Compaq is a solid partner for fast growing businesses," said Ward. "Their stability, manageability and reliability combined with good service made an immediate impact on our operations."

About Parson Group

Founded in Chicago in 1995 with a staff of five, Parson Group today employs 650 consultants and staff and serves nearly 600 clients. The company is defining a new market niche combining the best client benefits from the high-end staffing and consulting industries. What makes Parson Group unique is the company's ability to help clients both operate and optimize their finance and accounting functions. The pragmatic orientation of Parson Group's consultants, who have an average of 15 years experience, combined with a unique client service model make this possible.

The firm is headquartered in Chicago and has 13 offices nationwide. For more information, visit http://www.parsongroup.com.

About Compaq

Compaq Computer Corporation, a Fortune Global 100 company, is a leading global provider of technology and solutions. Compaq designs, develops, manufactures, and markets hardware, software, solutions, and services, including industry-leading enterprise computing solutions, fault-tolerant business-critical solutions, and communications products, commercial desktop and portable products, and consumer PCs that are sold in more than 200 countries. Information on Compaq and its products and services is available at http://www.compaq.com.