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McLeodUSA Selects CIENA MultiWave CoreDirector For Deployment On Its One Functional Network(SM)

Customers Will Benefit From Access to Seamless, Optical Network Architecture

McLeodUSA Incorporated (Nasdaq: MCLD), one of the nation's leading local telecommunications providers, has selected the MultiWave CoreDirectorTM from Ciena (CIEN) as the intelligent optical core switch for its One Functional NetworkSM (OFN) national, local, voice and data network.

McLeodUSA is continuing development of its next generation national data network, a part of OFN, and maintaining its steadfast commitment to customer utility. Customers have a set of fundamental needs -- for rapid provisioning, great customer service and for competitive prices -- that will be met by the unique approach offered by McLeodUSA. These advantages ultimately will benefit businesses in a wide range of cities, both where McLeodUSA already serves as an important provider of local services and on a national basis. The network is designed to serve customer needs today, and to efficiently evolve to take advantage of new customer requirements and new, all-optical technology in the future.

"Customers know that despite all the marketplace hoopla about exotic technologies, focus on the fundamentals of their business needs is what really matters," said Roy Wilkens, president and chief executive officer of McLeodUSA Data Services. "We thoroughly investigated a number of potential strategic vendor alliances in order to accomplish our objectives and drive data to the next generation. Ciena, like McLeodUSA, is focused on providing customers with seamless control, scalability and interoperability."

The Ciena product set will allow McLeodUSA to create an automated, self-aware network that eliminates the need for ring-based topologies and reduces layers of complexity associated with static, legacy networking systems. In addition, the network's mesh design will reduce capital and operating costs, resulting in savings and competitive advantages. This network design will enable provisioning across the network in minutes instead of months and will deliver highly customized levels of service.

The flexibility of CoreDirector will allow McLeodUSA to develop web-based tools that will enable its customers to make real-time choices concerning their bandwidth and circuit requirements; the type of connectivity that meets their needs; levels of service quality and choice of billing options. The use of ubiquitous mesh networking throughout the national backbone allows the first truly on-demand customer care system.

"McLeodUSA and Ciena share a vision for OFN, which includes using distributed intelligence to manage a simple, flexible and differentiating network," said Patrick Nettles, chairman and chief executive officer of Ciena. "We look forward to working with the McLeodUSA team to provide the network capacity and flexibility that end-users require for their evolving applications."

The agreement calls for delivery of CoreDirector switches during the first quarter of this year and anticipates more than 50 switches to be installed in major U.S. markets and at key network junctions by the end of 2001. The contract also encompasses the MultiWave CoreStreamTM intelligent optical transport system and LightWorks ON-CenterTM network management software from Ciena. Total estimated value of the purchase agreement is more than $200 million.

The McLeodUSA OFN network will stretch across more than 30,000 inter- and intracity route miles of fiber-optic capacity when completed and initially will terminate traffic via physical points of presence in more than 50 cities across the continental United States. Selected routes will be in service in 2001. Potential customers of the data network include telecommunications carriers, Internet service providers, application service providers, Web hosting companies, integrators, Fortune 500 companies and other companies that use long-haul network capacity as a core component of their business.