News release

HP Products and Services Support Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 and SharePoint Products and Technologies

High-Performance Solutions, Testing and Support Helps Customers Achieve High Levels of Productivity

HP (NYSE:HPQ) today announced strong support for the upcoming Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 and SharePoint Products and Technologies. HP ProLiant server platforms, combined with HP Services, offer robust and comprehensive solutions with Exchange Server 2003 and Microsoft® Office SharePoint Portal Server 2003 and Windows® SharePoint Services software.

"For more than 20 years, HP and Microsoft have jointly engineered IT business solutions that deliver the highest levels of return on investment for our customers," said Ron Eller, vice president, HP Industry Standard Server Solutions. "Exchange Server 2003 and SharePoint Products and Technologies on industry-standard HP ProLiant servers help customers improve productivity by connecting people to critical information, a capability crucial to responding to opportunities and changes in the business environment."

HP is the only designated Worldwide Prime Integrator of Microsoft technologies. HP Services and HP/Microsoft Certified Partner Services deliver outstanding service and support for Exchange, SharePoint Products and Technologies, and .NET, as well as supporting mobility on all of these applications. Underscoring HP's commitment to customers, HP offers recommended configurations based on number of users for a given hardware platform to ensure that the correct solution configuration and solution performance is achieved in order to meet business goals.

HP ProLiant Servers: The Platform of Choice for Exchange 2003

Exchange Server 2003 will provide IT managers and information workers breakthrough advances in system manageability and productivity. HP is uniquely positioned to offer customers Exchange 2003 solutions that have been tested by HP in terms of configuration and performance.

The HP ProLiant server family offers the most complete and capable industry-standard servers, including blade servers and clustering solutions, available for the Exchange 2003 solution. Additionally, the HP ProLiant Essentials Foundation Pack, included with every ProLiant server, enables fast and reliable deployment, easy management and simplified care of the server. With ProLiant Essentials Value packs and HP OpenView software, customers are able to achieve unparalleled control over their Microsoft Exchange implementation. OpenView Smart Plug-ins for Exchange provides service-level monitoring of the Exchange infrastructure and integration between OpenView and HP Insight Manager ensures that the solution is well managed at all levels.

HP is the leading provider of Microsoft Exchange-based solutions with more installed base customers than any other provider.⁽¹⁾ This broad portfolio and dependable services support enables a smooth transition for customers, making HP ProLiant servers the platform of choice for Microsoft Exchange solutions. HP's highly trained group of professionals includes more than 3,500 Microsoft-certified system engineers and more than 850 dedicated Exchange experts who are experienced in setting up Exchange and mobile Exchange environments. In addition, HP's extensive partner network extends the company's marketplace reach for ProLiant servers and Microsoft Exchange solutions.

"HP Services consultants clearly had the first-hand experience we needed," said Nigel Stevens, vice president, information systems and technology alliances worldwide, Reed Elsevier. "We know we'll migrate to Exchange 2003 as soon as it's available."

Leadership Solutions and Expertise in Deploying SharePoint Products and Technologies

Working with Microsoft, HP has taken a leadership role in the testing and development of best practices for architecting and deploying Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server 2003 and Windows SharePoint Services. As part of HP's own internal "Knowledge Network" based originally on SharePoint Portal Server 2001, thousands of HP consultants worldwide will be using SharePoint Portal Server 2003 and Windows SharePoint Services. In addition, based on extensive lab testing in coordination with Microsoft, HP is publishing online technical recommendations for SharePoint Products and Technologies to minimize risks and help ensure customers experience a smooth and successful SharePoint Portal Server 2003 deployment. The online content provides information on performance, configuration, architecture and achieving high availability with SharePoint and related partner solutions.

HP has also developed new solutions and services around SharePoint Portal Server 2003 such as Express Service for fast deployment and migration services from SharePoint Portal Server 2001 to SharePoint Portal Server 2003. Examples of HP Collaboration Portal Solutions for SharePoint Portal Server 2003 include a document information system, e-learning portal and program management solution.

Lake Washington School District is deploying the HP Education Enterprise Portal solution for all teachers, administrators, students and parents, based on Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server 2003. "Through HP's Education Enterprise Learning Portal, we will have more access to specific and aggregated data because all our systems are linked together. This allows us to offer targeted information to teachers, parents and administrators and provide materials for individual student needs," said Chip Kimball, assistant superintendent of Lake Washington School District. "We appreciate HP's long-standing commitment to education. With HP as a partner, we can realize the full potential of our technology investment."

"SharePoint products and technologies were designed to be able to provide portal and collaboration services to the next generation of business applications," said Mike Gelon, director of information worker servers and services, Microsoft Corp. "We're delighted to see development efforts from HP make that investment pay off."

More information about HP and Microsoft solutions is available at http://www.hp.com/solutions/microsoft/exchange and http://www.hp.com/solutions/microsoft/sharepoint.

About HP

HP delivers vital technology for business and life. The company's solutions span IT infrastructure, personal computing and access devices, global services and imaging and printing for consumers, enterprises and small and medium business. For the last four quarters, HP revenue totaled $70.4 billion. More information about HP is available at http://www.hp.com.

⁽¹⁾ According to a custom study done by Windows & .NET Magazine in association with Up2Right Consulting in 2002, HP has 54 percent market share of Microsoft Exchange implementations in large enterprises.

Microsoft and Windows are US registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.

This news release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties, as well as assumptions that, if they never materialize or prove incorrect, could cause the results of HP and its consolidated subsidiaries to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. All statements other than statements of historical fact are statements that could be deemed forward-looking statements, including any projections of earnings, revenues, or other financial items; any statements of the plans, strategies, and objectives of management for future operations; any statements concerning proposed new services or developments; any statements regarding future economic conditions or performance; statements of belief and any statement of assumptions underlying any of the foregoing. The risks, uncertainties and assumptions referred to above include employee management issues; the timely development, production and acceptance of services and their feature sets; the challenge of managing asset levels, including inventory; the difficulty of keeping expense growth at modest levels while increasing revenues; and other risks that are described from time to time in HP's Securities and Exchange Commission reports, including but not limited to HP's quarterly report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended January 31, 2003, and subsequently filed reports. If any of these risks or uncertainties materializes or any of these assumptions proves incorrect, HP's results could differ materially from HP's expectations in these statements. HP assumes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements.