Minneapolis 311 Voice Network

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Media Contacts:
Jacob Rice
Siemens Communications, Inc.
561.923.8347
jacob.rice@siemens.com

Minneapolis Activates "3-1-1" Citizen Response Number In An Effort To Improve Community Service And Disaster Recovery Capabilities With Siemens HiPath Solution And Integration By Partner Black Box Network Services

City's Implementation of 3-1-1 Allows for 9-1-1 To Focus On True Emergency Calls, While Consolidating Contact Centers And Locations To Promote Greater Efficiency, Productivity And Responsiveness

Boca Raton, Fla. — October 9, 2007 — Minneapolis, Minn. has joined a number of cities pioneering the use of 3-1-1 services—a single phone number that provides its 380,000 citizens with faster access to non-emergency city government services. The City recently enacted its 3-1-1 services via a comprehensive, Internet Protocol (IP) based open communications infrastructure from Siemens Communications, Inc. [NYSE: SI] and installed by Black Box Network Services [NASDAQ: BBOX], a leading U.S. communications integrator and authorized Siemens HiPath reseller.

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) authorized the 3-1-1 number in 1997 but only recently have municipalities like Minneapolis started implementing it. A key function is to offload 9-1-1 calls, of which an estimated 60 percent are non-emergency.

"3-1-1 is a huge initiative for us, and we needed to implement a more reliable telecommunications platform and robust applications for that to be successful," says Connie Perila, Manager of Telecommunications and Network Services for the city of Minneapolis. "Not only does it offload 9-1-1 and let us improve our responsiveness to our citizens' needs, but it also will help us address other disaster recovery scenarios by giving us a way to field excess 9-1-1 calls in the event of a citywide catastrophe."

Although 3-1-1 access was a big reason Minneapolis chose to deploy a new communications network, it also consolidated communications across 15 smaller contact centers and 35 locations. In doing so, it gained other benefits including facilitating greater employee productivity, increased customer satisfaction, simplified administration through centralization, and lower maintenance and service costs.

The City's new network provides the following benefits, with principal components from the Siemens HiPath portfolio that was proposed by Black Box

- A survivable, scalable and redundant IP-based communications infrastructure for fault tolerance, centralized administration, and broad applications support from the Siemens HiPath 4000 Real-Time IP System, a converged platform able to support both IP as well as legacy TDM communications capabilities

- Facilitating greater employee productivity with one-number, one message inbox via HiPath Xpressions, a unified messaging solution that combines communications—voice, email, short message services (SMS) and fax. City employees will be able to access their messages via a single device, such as a desk phone, mobile phone, PDA, desktop or notebook computer once unified messaging is implemented.

- Faster response to callers with advanced first-call resolution through the skills-based routing capabilities of HiPath ProCenter Enterprise, a feature-rich contact center solution offering intelligent call distribution, presence-based productivity tools, and extensive reporting , which has facilitated the city efforts to offer easier access to city resources and higher levels of service while simplifying administration.

Black Box Network Services and Siemens teamed up to make the City's transition from its nearly 20-year-old infrastructure to the new IP-based infrastructure as seamlessly as possible, maintaining existing call features and functionality while adding new capability with minimal training. The HiPath solution reflects the principles behind Siemens Open Communications: unified communication; IT-based communications; fixed-mobile convenience; business process integration; rich user experience; business continuity and integrity; and open service delivery.

According to Perila, "Citizen access to city services has improved, and the Siemens HiPath solutions have enhanced our ability to manage information, track calls and provide services via voice, email and the web. All of the functionally that we've added has helped to make 3-1-1 successful."

Donna Warner, vice president of Operations and Sales, Black Box Network Services, said the support Siemens provided throughout the 18 month requirements definition, system design and implementation phases was indispensable to the successful outcome of the Minneapolis network. "It was definitely a team effort," she says. "Siemens was always there for our people. Whenever we needed technical or engineering help, they were just a phone call away, and if we needed more support, a Siemens expert was on the next plane out."

To help Open Communications benefit more customers like Minneapolis and small and medium size private sector enterprises, Siemens has vastly expanded its network of resellers like Black Box Network Services. "We believe 3-1-1 services is a big opportunity for municipalities small and large in their efforts to increase productivity, efficiency and responsiveness to non-emergency citizen needs, all with the potential to lower their overall communications costs," says Rick Fitzgerald, Vice President, Large to Medium Enterprise Partners. "Integrators like Black Box are how we can help more and more cities capitalize on these opportunities."

About Siemens
Siemens AG (NYSE:SI) is one of the largest global electronics and engineering companies with reported worldwide sales of $107.4 billion in 2006. Founded 160 years ago, the company is a leader in the areas of Medical, Power, Automation and Control, Transportation, Information and Communications, Lighting, Building Technologies, Water Technologies and Services and Home Appliances. With its U.S. corporate headquarters in New York City, Siemens in the USA has sales of $21.4 billion and employs approximately 70,000 people throughout all 50 states and Puerto Rico. Eleven of Siemens' worldwide businesses are based in the United States. With its global headquarters in Munich, Siemens AG and its subsidiaries employ 480,000 people in 190 countries. For more information on Siemens in the United States: www.usa.siemens.com.

About Siemens Communications, Inc.
Siemens Communications, Inc. is one of the world's leading vendors of Open Communications solutions for enterprises of all sizes, enabling business processes to be more productive, faster and more secure – with any device, network or information technology infrastructure. The company is a wholly owned subsidiary of Siemens AG with about 15,000 employees globally and headquarters in Boca Raton, Fla. For more information, visit www.usa.siemens.com/communications.

Note: Siemens, HiPath, Xpressions, and ProCenter are registered trademarks of Siemens AG