Dedicated Server Web Hosting Firm, The Planet, Reports for Third Quarter

Houston, Texas - (Website Hosting Directory) - November 6, 2008 - Privately held dedicated web hosting company, The Planet, has reported its financial results for the third quarter, ending Sept. 30, 2008. The Planet provides quarterly updates to its customers, business partners and prospects with information relative to new initiatives and its progress.

With a new corporate moniker, The Planet plans to issue quarterly updates to provide its customers, business partners and prospects with information to validate its progress.

Douglas J. Erwin , Chairman and CEO of The Planet noted, ''We had another successful quarter of year-over-year growth rates, which are roughly twice that of the dedicated hosting industry, despite a difficult economic environment around the world. This was a quarter that set a new strategic course for our business, with our entry into managed hosting under the Planet Northstar brand. Coupled with our new Planet Alpha dedicated hosting moniker and an enhanced a la carte services portfolio, we now offer customers the broadest range of technical infrastructure solutions and service options in the business.''

Third Quarter Highlights include:

New Customers, Record Transaction: More than 1,500 new customers bringing the total to more than 25,000. The greatest growth during the quarter came from the company's current customers, who continued to upgrade and expand their server portfolios. In addition, the company hosts more than 13.3 million web sites.

New Web Site: The company introduced a new Web site designed for easy navigation and transparency that demonstrates its rich breadth of products and services. Customers are easily able to move between the corporate, Planet Alpha Dedicated Hosting and Planet Northstar Managed Hosting sites to identify the best services for their business.

New Product: The company added enterprise-class security and performance for private rack customers with Cisco ASA 5500 Series firewalls and Foundry ServerIronXL load balancers. The server portfolio expanded to include Dell's Clovertown quad-core PowerEdge servers that provide 1.2 Terabytes of storage.

trong Customer Activity: In the third quarter, the company added 1,600 customers, bringing the total to more than 25,000. The greatest growth during the quarter came from the company's current customers, who continued to upgrade and expand their server portfolios. In addition, the company hosts more than 13.3 million web sites.

Planet Northstar Managed Hosting: Under a new brand, the company announced its entry into the managed hosting business using its rigorous and proactive Anticipation Advantage planning methodology. Small- and medium-sized businesses gain access to enterprise-class IT managed hosting services starting with as few as two servers backed by a dedicated team of seasoned IT professionals who are personally accountable for their success.

Planet Alpha Dedicated Hosting: The company rebranded its core dedicated hosting business under the Planet Alpha moniker. Customers have the power to choose from a broad range of products from single servers to complex infrastructure solutions based on the precise fit for their businesses.

Planet Alpha Advanced Services: Based on its May 2008 acquisition of TouchSupport, the company added new advanced services to its dedicated servers hosting portfolio, including monitoring, security and server administration. The new Alpha Advanced Services supplement the administration and maintenance of customers self-managed dedicated servers to create the optimal management plan for their business. With these new choices, customers can lower their operational costs, and add to or improve the security and availability of their hosted environment.

Yankee Group White Paper: The company issued a new white paper from Yankee Group that details managed hosting services as a tangible consideration for organizations looking to reduce IT costs. Titled Leveraging Capex-Free Managed Hosting, it provides an insightful examination into the formidable IT barriers faced by SMBs in today's competitive business environment. It also emphasizes the choice of managed hosting services as a strategic and effective alternative that offers enterprise-class capabilities previously not affordable for most companies.

Customer Videos: Demonstrating the success of its new managed hosting services, four companies were featured in videos underscoring their decision to choose the company's managed hosting solutions: Houston-based NutshellMail.com

Computan Brazil's Atitude Digital Media and The Sant Corporation located in Cincinnati. Also featured this quarter is Planet Alpha customer Stone Bond Technologies.

Lights-Out Green Initiative: In a company-wide program, The Planet will reduce its yearly energy consumption through more efficient use of lighting, which is expected to deliver an annual savings of almost $140,000.

Mr. Erwin added, ''We continue to reap the benefits of previous investments in both our call center and our data center operations. Customer satisfaction is at an all-time high, and we continue our relentless focus on making The Planet the best choice for SMBs looking for enterprise-class IT infrastructure management.''

Kevin Klausmeyer, Chief Financial Officer remarked, ''The Planet again produced a record quarter, with our highest year-over-year revenue growth. Cash flows remain healthy, and our balance sheet remains strong. We are also pleased about having achieved new levels of efficiency in utilizing our assets.''

Ultimately, The Planet endeavors to provide the following:

High level of network capacity and speed to deliver peak performance
Instant scalability to handle even the largest spikes in network traffic
Parallel, redundant, multi-tiered network routing and switching architecture to assure reliability and stability
Multiple layer network security that prevents Delayed Denial of Service (DDOS) attacks from harming businesses
Knowledgeable experts with a passion for excellence and a commitment to operate the best networks in the business

The Planet is a leading provider of On Demand IT Infrastructure solutions, hosting more than 25,000 small and medium size businesses and 13.3 million web sites worldwide, using the best choice of servers, software tools and support, backed by state-of-the-art facilities and network connectivity.

Adding to its broad array of awards, The Planet ranked #81 on the Deloitte Technology Fast 500 list for North America. The annual survey recognizes the 500 fastest-growing technology companies in the nation based on consolidated results from its regional Fast 50 events. The win capped a series of awards during the year, including ranking #12 on the Fast 50 list for Texas; the Computer Reseller News Fast Growth list; and the Inc. 5000 roster.

For more information about The Planet, please visit: www.theplanet.com.

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