BackWeb and Mercado Software to Offer Polite Push Infrastructure to E-Commerce Customers Worldwide

BackWeb Foundation Software Enables Bandwidth-Efficient Delivery of Catalog And E-Commerce Databases

SAN JOSE, Calif., -- Nov. 6 -- BackWeb® Technologies, a leading provider of push for e-business solutions, and Mercado™ Software Inc., the leading provider of e-catalog search solutions to improve online buying and selling, today announced that they will offer a joint e-commerce solution to improve data transfer of large e-Catalogs across networks.

This enhanced delivery option allows for remote e-catalog staging and speeds the delivery of e-catalog data for Mercado Software customers, as huge files and content can be received whenever network bandwidth is available. BackWeb's push infrastructure will let Mercado Software customers easily send massive e-catalogs over any network, whenever they want to.

"BackWeb's push infrastructure is a valuable addition to Mercado Software customers who face considerable challenges when they transport their back-end databases and e-catalogs across networks,'' said John Sliney, vice president of marketing at Mercado Software. "Because BackWeb technology promises to make our search solutions even more powerful, we expect Polite push to be a popular value-added feature for e-commerce innovators the world over.''

"Rapid deployment has become a key necessity for e-businesses today,'' said Erez Lorber, vice president of worldwide business development at BackWeb Technologies.

"By offering BackWeb's Polite push technology as an efficient way to move data across networks, Mercado Software will provide the same competitive advantage enjoyed by Global 2000 leaders who have deployed BackWeb throughout their organizations.''

BackWeb's Polite™ push technology transmits information only when network bandwidth is available, so users can receive content in the background without affecting the performance of other network applications such as email and browsing. BackWeb delivers digital packages of any size or format, including audio, video, graphics and html.

Built from the ground up to search content-rich e-catalogs, Mercado Software's IntuiFind search solution lets buyers find exactly what they look for, regardless of spelling, terminology, or wording-all without the need to understand the complexities of underlying data infrastructure. IntuiFind features more than 50 powerful linguistic knowledge banks designed specifically for understanding structural databases, and it lets buyers define their requests in their own words, without being forced to match the catalog database's specific content or terminology. IntuiFind also easily integrates with any database and commerce platform through open APIs for rapid deployment. Business-driven search capabilities combine IntuiFind's powerful search with merchandising logic and personalized information to improve the seller's bottom line.

About Mercado Software
Mercado Software is the leading provider of e-Catalog search solutions for improving online buying and selling. Designed from the ground up for e-Commerce, Mercado Software's IntuiFind provides B2B, B2C, e-Marketplaces, and e-Procurement with powerful search solutions ensuring customers quickly find products they look for. This intuitive search significantly improves browser-to-buyer conversion rates and customer satisfaction and retention to help increase site profitability. IntuiFind also provides e-Catalogs with business-driven merchandising and personalization capabilities to improve sales. Mercado Software's customers include major e-Commerce companies such as Tower Records, Blockbuster Video, Webvan, Firmbuy, Outpurchase.com, Caterpillar Corporation, US Office Products, Quelle and BellSouth. Headquartered in Palo Alto, Calif., Mercado Software also has offices in Dallas, New York, Minneapolis, Tel Aviv, Israel, and Uxbridge, England, its European headquarters. For more information, visit http://www.mercado.com.

About BackWeb Technologies
BackWeb Technologies is a leading offline Web software company. BackWeb extends the value of technology investments by offering mobile and remote employees offline access to portals, intranets and other Web-based applications and content. The company's products reduce network costs and improve the productivity of an increasingly mobile workforce. At the core of BackWeb's products is its patented Polite® synchronization technology that can distribute large amounts of data even over narrow bandwidth connections. BackWeb® customers include market leaders such as Boehringer Ingelheim, Centocor, Eastman Kodak, GE Healthcare, Guidant, HP, KLA Tencor, Lam Research, Pfizer and more than one hundred other companies. BackWeb also has strategic reseller alliances with software industry leaders: Plumtree, SAP and IBM. The company is headquartered in San Jose, Calif. and Rosh Ha'ayin, Israel. For more information, visit www.backweb.com or call (800) 863-0100.

Statements in this news release, which are not purely historical, are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the U.S. Securities laws, including statements of beliefs, plans, expectations or intentions regarding the future. Examples of these statements include, but are not limited to, the ability of BackWeb software to allow customers to gain mobile, disconnected use of their portals and help increase field sales and field service productivity, the integration of BackWeb software with BEA products will help developers extend portal applications for offline use without changing the way they work, and the ability of the resulting applications to help field sales and service organizations realize maximum productivity, cost savings, and process acceleration gains while disconnected from the network. Actual results could differ materially from those in such forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially include unforeseen technological issues related to use of the BackWeb software, deployment issues related to implementation, unforeseen software errors, competitive factors and business and expense factors that may affect the perceived efficiencies from use of BackWeb's products, and the risks and uncertainties detailed from time to time in BackWeb's periodic reports and registration statements filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. BackWeb assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements contained in this press release.