MUMBAI, India - June 4, 2004 - Tata Indicom, one of the country's leading telecom and Internet service providers and a leader in the Corporate telecom space, today announced its domestic IP-VPN Network service has received the Cisco Powered Network designation, making it the country's first service to achieve an internationally-recognised accreditation. Tata Indicom also announced that it has migrated its domestic IP-VPN network to the Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) platform. The network enhancement is a result of Tata Indicom's close collaboration with Cisco Systems for the provisioning of state-of-the-art services and solutions for its enterprise and corporate customers. The Tata Group provisions its domestic IP-VPN services through its Group companies, Tata Internet Services Limited and VSNL.

The Cisco Powered Network designation is granted to a telecom service provider's service once it meets a set of prescribed standards identified by Cisco, including building its network around industry-leading technology.

Speaking on the achievement, Mr. Sandeep Mathur, President, Tata Indicom Enterprise Business Unit (TIEBU) said, "Tata Indicom today is by far the leader in the Corporate Data space and caters to the complex telecom needs of large blue chip enterprises, including several Fortune 500 companies operating in India. With a view to effectively meeting their requirements, we at Tata Indicom, have been seeking to adopt the best international practices. The attainment of the Cisco Powered Network designation is an affirmation of our commitment to building our network around leading edge technology."

Added Mr. Ranajoy Punja, Vice President, Marketing, Cisco Systems India & SAARC, "Cisco is pleased to confer our first Cisco Powered Network designation in India to Tata Indicom's domestic IP-VPN. The Cisco Powered Network designation is a culmination of our close collaboration and shows that Cisco is able to bring tremendous value to our service provider customers. The service provider industry is an increasingly competitive one and being able to deliver world-class services such as MPLS IP-VPN to corporations will give Tata the tools to effectively address the growing market for enterprise data, voice and video services."

Tata Indicom's MPLS Internet IP-VPN is a cost effective and reliable domestic access service for Enterprise and Corporate customers. MPLS IP-VPN allows cost-effective, easy connectivity to corporations between their associates, business partners and employees on a highly reliable, robust, state-of-the-art infrastructure and secured network. Tata Indicom has devised its MPLS IP-VPN solutions such that it caters to the need of every kind of customer.

Tata Indicom's new MPLS IP-VPN services offer the following advantages to its customers:

• End-to-end Managed Network facilities, network management and monitoring on a 24x7 basis ensuring network reliability and availability and reduces cost of ownership of the customer, thus improving return on investment in their businesses.
• Flexible, Robust Network Architecture - MPLS-based network architecture provides any-to-any connectivity allowing a unified connection for intranet, extranet and Internet access for continuous communications among all connected locations.
• Differentiated Classes of Service - Accommodates and optimizes various types of applications allowing traffic prioritization achieving cost-efficiency.
• Redundancy - Takes advantage of inherent redundancy of the Internet providing high availability
• Faster setup times - Minimization or elimination of time lags associated with an intercity leased line network, which in the past could take anywhere between 6-12 weeks depending on locations
• Works transparently on multiple last-mile Internet connectivity at various locations via leased line, ISDN dial-up, PSTN dial-up and radio connectivity
• Highly Flexible - Dial-up IP-VPN can be used by mobile users to securely connect from laptops having Internet connection
• Cost-effective solution for corporate intranet
• Easily scalable at minimal cost
• Well protected and secured network

The Cisco Powered Network program, will further offer Tata Indicom the following benefits:

• Enhanced credibility with business customers - the Cisco Powered Network mark associates the company with the worldwide leader in networking for the Internet.
• Higher-quality services brought to market faster - As Cisco equipment is the same equipment used by a majority of Fortune 1000 companies, Tata Indicom can bring new services to market sooner.
• Technical advantages in building the Tata Indicom network-Through this association, Tata Indicom can benefit from Cisco's expertise in building IP data networks and undertaking comprehensive network audits wherein Cisco ensures optimum performance of the network.

About TIEBU

The Tata Indicom Enterprise Business Unit (TIEBU) was formed in the month of April after the signing of an MoU between VSNL, Tata Teleservices Limited, Tata Teleservices (Maharashtra) Limited and Tata Internet Services Limited. The TIEBU combine was later extended to include TataNet, the VSAT arm of the Tata's. TIEBU is now the single point interface through which the Group companies deliver telecom services to key Enterprise customers of the Tata Group across India. The key role of the TIEBU, as conceptualized by the Group, is focused business development; wherein TIEBU, on behalf of the Group companies, targets Enterprises with sizable telecom spends and offers them customized end-to-end voice and data solutions, under the Tata Indicom brand.