<B>e-Fiber Meets Member Milestone</B>

e-Fiber, LLC announced has reached the 500 member milestone. The company has registered over 150 mill sites, 200 direct suppliers, 100 brokers/agents and exporters and 50 industry service providers to its service in its first full year of Internet operations.

"We are quite pleased with the growth we have experienced over the past year and are looking forward to expanding our service offerings for our network," states Doug Mowery, e-Fiber’s president and CEO. "Unlike most paper industry Internet sites, e-Fiber focuses on the supply of products and services to pulp and paper mills and not from them." E-Fiber is expanding its service offerings to include chemicals, transportation, equipment, MRO supplies, consumable items and other goods and services that mills buy.

e-Fiber provides direct, electronic communication of transactional data for existing supplier/customer relationships as well as an online marketplace. "Mills are not out to replace the supplier relationships they have developed for years for the possibility of saving a couple bucks in an auction or exchange," Mowery adds. "While open marketplace purchases may be attractive in certain instances, the true value for the industry in utilizing the Internet to conduct their business lies in streamlining the transactional process from requisition to payment. Driving costs out of the purchasing process is what e-Fiber is all about."

e-Fiber is seeking closer alliances with pulp and paper mills and suppliers of all goods and services that mills consume. "We’re off to a great start with 500 members in the fiber sector," Mowery states. "Now we are building on that to provide full service procurement functions for pulp and paper mills worldwide.