STAMFORD, Conn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--September 18, 2000--Pitney Bowes Inc. (NYSE: PBI) today announced that it has filed suit against Stamps.com Inc. of Santa Monica, Calif., in the United States District Court in the Eastern District of Texas. The complaint charges Stamps.com with infringement of four Pitney Bowes shipping patents.

Pitney Bowes has a long history of licensing its technology, and currently has agreements with companies in a variety of industries, including shipping, printing, word processing and mailing.

"With over 3,300 active patents worldwide, we are committed to strategically managing our vast intellectual property portfolio to enhance shareholder value," said Michael E. Melton, Deputy General Counsel, Intellectual Property and Technology Law, Pitney Bowes Inc. "We have attempted to reach a negotiated solution with Stamps.com to license use of Pitney Bowes' patented inventions in their iShip product line. In the absence of such an agreement, however, we have an obligation to take the necessary steps to protect our shareholders' technology investments."

According to U.S. Patent Office statistics Pitney Bowes has been granted more business method patents each year than any other company since 1980. The patents named in the suit are used today in a variety of Pitney Bowes shipping and logistics systems such as Conquest, Carrier Manager, Ascent, and ValueShip. While Pitney Bowes has over 50 patents in the shipping arena, the ones currently in dispute cover key processes for shipping and tracking of packages and other mailed items, such as:

• using electronic data interchange (EDI) to process a manifest for package/parcel tracking and rate information from multiple carriers

• accessing data such as rate information about multiple package/parcel carriers

• storing registration information about multiple package/parcel carriers

• managing a package/parcel carrier information storage system or library containing a registry of specific information about multiple carriers such as their respective routes and corresponding rates

Earlier this year the Intellectual Property Owners (IPO) Association ranked Pitney Bowes in the top 200 companies worldwide receiving U.S. patents for the 14th consecutive year. The company's wealth of intellectual assets cover a range of technologies and business applications that are key in the new economy such as ticketing, cellular telephones, shipping, laser printing, encryption and mailing to name a few.

Pitney Bowes Inc. is a $4.4 billion global provider of total messaging solutions. It serves over 2 million businesses of all sizes in 118 countries through dealer and direct operations. For more information about the company, visit www.pitneybowes.com.

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