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MicroStrategy Announces Co-Marketing Efforts with IBM

Combining DSS Broadcaster™ with DB2 Universal Database and Lotus Notes to Help Corporations Significantly Increase the ROI on Their Data Warehouses

VIENNA, VA, September 1, 1998 — MicroStrategy Incorporated (NASDAQ: MSTR), a leading provider of mission-critical decision support systems, today announced that it has entered into a co-marketing initiative with IBM to market IBM’s DB2* Universal Database and Lotus Notes** products in conjunction with MicroStrategy’s newly-announced DSS Broadcaster™ product. (See related announcement "MicroStrategy Announces the General Availability of DSS Broadcaster: A Revolutionary New Product for Corporate Decision Support and E-Business Broadcast Services" made August 11, 1998.)

The initiative encompasses a broad base of marketing activities including seminar series, customer success stories, ad campaigns, and direct mail efforts concentrated mainly on the synergy that exists between DSS Broadcaster and IBM’s products. DSS Broadcaster is a powerful information broadcast server that leverages existing and emerging communication channels—including e-mail, fax, pager and mobile phone—to extend information access to all levels of the enterprise. By delivering personalized information from a DB2 Universal Database data warehouse to users, DSS Broadcaster helps organizations leverage their IBM software and hardware investments.

"As a leader in global business intelligence, IBM recognizes the need for organizations to deploy a comprehensive solution to meet the information needs of their entire enterprise," said Steve Solazzo, vice president Solution Developers and Small/Growing Businesses, IBM Software Group. "Companies using MicroStrategy’s DSS Broadcaster, IBM’s DB2 Universal Database and Lotus Notes have the infrastructure to revolutionize their business by providing users with timely, mission-critical information as soon as certain pre-defined conditions are met. These products will allow businesses to easily respond to competitive and internal pressures, improve operations, and enhance productivity better than ever before."

DSS Broadcaster turns data warehouses into active systems that constantly search for relevant information to broadcast to users who have subscribed to personalized information services. Because messages are delivered through common business devices such as e-mail, Lotus Notes, fax or mobile phone, more users can leverage the information stored in the DB2 data warehouse, including members of the supply chain, as well as partners, customers and consumers.

"Traditional data warehouses have been passive in nature—they must wait for users to ask questions of the system," said Michael J. Saylor, president and CEO of MicroStrategy Incorporated. "This results in a situation where individual users must invest considerable time and effort before they realize any benefits. Through our collaboration with IBM, DSS Broadcaster changes all of this by delivering an entire business intelligence and data warehousing solution that removes the barriers to information and meets the needs of most users in an enterprise."

Customers Excited about DSS Broadcaster and DB2 Universal Database Integration

Customers are excited about DSS Broadcaster and the ability to integrate it into their existing DB2 Universal Database and Lotus Notes environments. Project manager Juergen Schettler of BonnData, an outsourced IT division of the Deutsche Bank, commented, "In our business it’s critical that users receive the information they need in the most useful and appropriate way. By delivering personalized information within our intranet based on Lotus Notes, DSS Broadcaster will allow us to disseminate more mission-critical information cheaper and faster than ever before, thereby maximizing the return on our DB2 Universal Database and MicroStrategy investments. The Lotus Notes/DSS Broadcaster/DB2 Universal Database combination is very well-suited to meet the business intelligence needs even of those users who don’t have the need or ability to start a powerful PC application, but want to get their statistics just in time and through the same channel as any other business information."

About DB2 Universal Database and Lotus Notes

IBM’s DB2 Universal Database is the industry’s first multimedia, Web-ready relational database management system—powerful enough to meet the demands of large corporations and flexible enough to serve medium-sized and small businesses. DB2 Universal Database combines the power of business intelligence (decision support, data warehousing and data mining) with industry-leading performance and reliability for transaction processing. It delivers on IBM’s network computing promise, linking the world’s business information with the Internet.

DB2 Universal Database can house the information that MicroStrategy’s DSS Broadcaster distributes. DB2 Universal Database has the capability to store any data—from comprehensive marketing, finance, production and general business information to individual executive’s data—safely and securely. MicroStrategy’s DSS Suite is optimized for DB2 Universal Database, saving users time by using the built-in range of intelligent performance techniques for running reports. DB2 Universal Database’s tremendous Web capability and open, cross-platform design actively support the business necessity of sharing information to empower employees, link with partners and actively engage with customers. This functionality underpins DSS Broadcaster with exceptional availability, reliability and ease of use.

The addition of Lotus Notes to the DSS Broadcaster solution provides integrated messaging, calendaring, Web access and personal task management functions with one seamless user interface.

* Indicates a trademark or registered trademark of International Business Machines Corporation.

** Lotus and Lotus Notes are registered trademarks of Lotus Development Corporation.

Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

About MicroStrategy Incorporated

MicroStrategy is a leading worldwide provider of enterprise decision support system (“DSS”) software and related services. MicroStrategy’s suite of products (“DSS Suite”) enables both active and passive delivery of information from large-scale databases, providing Global 2000 enterprise user communities with timely answers to mission-critical questions.

MicroStrategy’s decision support platform enables users to query and analyze the most detailed, transaction-level databases, turning data into business intelligence. In addition to supporting internal enterprise users, MicroStrategy’s products extend DSS beyond corporate boundaries to customers, partners and supply chain constituencies through a broad range of pull and push technology such as the Internet, e-mail, telephones, pagers and other wireless communications devices. MicroStrategy also offers a comprehensive set of consulting, training and support services for its customers and partners.

MicroStrategy has over 500 customers across such diverse industries as retail, telecommunications, finance, insurance, healthcare, pharmaceuticals and consumer packaged goods. MicroStrategy’s customers use DSS Suite to perform mission-critical activities such as: customer segmentation and profitability analysis; supply chain management; one-to-one customer marketing; financial analysis; customer acquisition, retention, and churn analysis; merchandising and inventory analysis; product category management; and customer risk profiling. Representative MicroStrategy customers include American Express Travel Services, CVS Pharmacy, Harris Teeter, IMS America, Kmart, MCI, Merck-Medco, Nike, Ralston Purina, and WorldCom. MicroStrategy has also entered into relationships with more than 80 system integration, application development and platform partners, including Acxiom, Andersen Consulting, IBM, Intrepid Systems, NCR, and Oracle.

F or more information, please visit MicroStrategy’s Web-site: www.strategy.com.

This press release includes statements that may constitute “forward-looking” statements, usually containing the words believe”, “estimate”, “project”, “expect” or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences include continued acceptance of the Company’s products in the marketplace, the timing of significant orders, delays in the Company’s ability to develop or ship new products, market acceptance of new products, competitive factors, general economic conditions, currency fluctuations, and other risks detailed in the Company’s registration statements and periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, the Company undertakes no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this release.

MicroStrategy, DSS Broadcaster are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.