Siemens and SPEEDUS Team Together in Start-Up to Develop Technology For Rapidly Detecting Valvular Heart Disease During Routine Patient Examinations

Acoustic Technology to Detect Heart Abnormalities; Speedia Wireless Gets Exclusive Development and Data Processing Contract
Princeton, N.J., January 16, 2001: Siemens Corporate Research, Inc. (SCR), a subsidiary of Siemens Corporation, and SPEEDUS.COM, Inc. (Nasdaq: SPDE) announced their co-investment in a new company, Sound Diagnostics, Inc. (SDI), to develop, manufacture and market advanced diagnostic products and services to enable primary care physicians and other healthcare providers to detect heart abnormalities that might otherwise go undetected during an office visit.

In connection with SCR's investment, Sound Diagnostics acquired ownership of certain diagnostic technologies developed by SCR. As a result, Sound Diagnostics currently has three (3) patents pending. SCR and SPEEDUS acquired equal stakes in SDI as a result of their seed funding of the venture.

Speedia Wireless, a wholly owned subsidiary of SPEEDUS, has signed an exclusive contract with SDI to design and develop the wireless applications for SDI, as well as provide transaction processing to support the commercial rollout of the SDI cardiac diagnostic products.

"There are strong incentives for improving the diagnostic accuracy of cardiac auscultation--listening to the heart with a stethoscope--to reduce the cost of unnecessary echocardiograms and to detect latent cases of valvular heart disease," said Raymond Watrous, Ph.D., Chief Technology Officer and Founder of SDI. "Computer-assisted auscultation will dramatically improve the ability of listeners to detect abnormalities, and by providing wireless access to a web-based signals archive, physicians will be able to access patient data, perform serial comparisons and make online referrals," Dr. Watrous noted.

The technology for the new company dates back to 1997 when a prototype system was developed that comprised multiple sensors (ECG, phonocardiogram and pulse oximetry sensors), signal processing algorithms and bayesian networks for probabilistic reasoning. A prototype algorithm developed by Dr. Watrous and his team at SCR is able to identify basic heart sounds and murmurs and derive clinical findings that should assist physicians and other healthcare providers in distinguishing innocent from pathological heart murmurs.

"This is an exciting opportunity to commercialize a technology developed at SCR by participating in the capitalization of a new company together with SPEEDUS," noted Dr. Thomas Grandke, President and CEO of SCR. "Improving the primary care physician's ability to offer patients an advanced cardiac auscultation in the office benefits the patient and the physician. The technology should also help reduce the time and cost of undergoing unnecessary diagnostic procedures. The addition of the wireless expertise provided by Speedia is expected to extend the reach and ease of use for the core technology to more patients and by more types of physicians."

Michael Bacon, Executive Vice President of SPEEDUS and Speedia Wireless, said "Speedia's development of a sound flexible wireless architecture will allow us the opportunity to connect the leading edge medical diagnostic technology developed by SCR to physicians. Additionally, we have structured this investment in a manner that provides SPEEDUS shareholders exciting upside by potential appreciation in the equity we have in Sound Diagnostics while at the same time potentially delivering, in the long term, revenues for Speedia."

"SPEEDUS is focused on building valuable relationships with industry leaders such as Siemens by leveraging their technologies with ours and sharing the benefits together from the ground level," said Shant S. Hovnanian, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of SPEEDUS.

About Speedia Wireless

Speedia Wireless delivers end-to-end wireless solutions that enable companies to develop and implement wireless strategies for their customers and mobile employees. With the WorkforceGo product, organizations have an integrated, scalable and easy-to-use solution for real-time, mobile e-mail, business intelligence, reports, and access to legacy applications through a single wireless and web portal, across their extended enterprise. More information can be found on Speedia's web site at http://www.speedia.com or by calling 1-888-speedia (888.773.3342).

Additional information on SPEEDUS and its services is available at http://www.speedus.com or by calling 718.567.4300.

About Siemens Corporate Research

Siemens Corporate Research, Inc., one of five Siemens R&D centers worldwide, is an affiliate of Siemens AG and is associated with Siemens AG's Corporate Technology organization. First established in the U.S. in 1977, and now based in the Princeton Forrestal Center, SCR is staffed by approximately 150 research and support professionals.

Siemens AG, based in Berlin and Munich, is a leading global electronics and engineering company employing over 447,000 people in 193 countries, with sales in excess of $74 billion worldwide in fiscal 2000 (10/1/99 ? 9/30/00).

The U.S. is the single largest market for Siemens globally. In the U.S., Siemens employs over 73,000 employees and achieved sales of more than $17 billion in fiscal 2000. Siemens' U.S. businesses are leaders in the information and communication, healthcare, energy, industry, financial services, transportation, and lighting sectors.

Additional information about SCR can be found at their web site: http://www.scr.siemens.com.

###

CONTACTS:
Justin Blake
EDELMAN
(212) 704-8165
justin.blake@edelman.com

Thomas M. Finn
SPEEDUS
(718) 567-4398
tfinn@speedus.com

The information about this product is preliminary. The product is under development and not commercially available in the U.S., and its future availability cannot be ensured.