Coulomb chooses Abovenet Communications UK Ltd. for private optical network in London

London, October 1, 2003 —AboveNet Communications UK Ltd., the leading provider of optical infrastructure services for unconstrained information exchange, announced today that it has contracted with Coulomb, the leading provider of Internet billing and 21st century communications services, for the installation of a private optical fiber network around London. Coulomb will use the network to connect its London PoPs with its Docklands office and several of the co-location points and carrier hotels in London.

"We chose AboveNet because they ranked top in professional approach, competitive pricing and commitment to this area out of all the suppliers we considered," said David Knell, Coulomb's Technical Director. "It's rare for a supplier to achieve this feat, and we look forward to a long and fruitful working relationship."

By using AboveNet's services, Coulomb can ensure a superior user experience for customers. AboveNet owns and controls the underlying infrastructure enabling the company to create a comprehensive network that can transport tremendous amounts of information, scale easily and allow customers to bypass the bottlenecks of the public network.

"This is an important development for us," said Knell. "It not only provides us with a resilient connection between our two sites - which is key to achieving the increased reliability which a dual-site solution can provide - but also allows us to interconnect quickly and easily with any other carrier in London who has a presence at any carrier hotel. The dark fiber gives us virtually unlimited bandwidth, which should support our growth for the future."

"AboveNet offers enterprise customers like Coulomb the ability to add a new layer of reliability and resilience to their networks with the additional benefit of having full control of their service allocation and provisioning," said John Dowbiggin, Managing Director of AboveNet Communications UK Ltd. "We are delighted to offer Coulomb a high-performance, secure and reliable optical network solution. We are pleased they have chosen us to provide the solution to meet their current and future needs."

About Coulomb
Coulomb is a leading provider of internet billing solutions, ranging from credit cards through internet diallers to premium SMS. Coulomb Carrier Services provides commercially and technologically innovative solutions to problems in today's telecommunications marketplace.

About AboveNet, Inc.
AboveNet, Inc., the US parent company of AboveNet Communications UK Ltd., is the leading provider of network infrastructure services that enable unconstrained information exchange within and between businesses. AboveNet builds and operates an office-to-office, 100-per cent optical network enabling customers to create an efficient, cost-effective network that breaks economic and performance barriers imposed in the last mile by complex legacy telecom infrastructures. With the most extensive metropolitan optical network in the world, data centers throughout the US and Europe, top quality managed services and a high-performance IP network, AboveNet is able to offer the most flexible and complete information exchange solutions in the industry.

An aggressive and agile player in the industry, AboveNet provides security, performance, scalability and reliability in a wealth of interconnected services designed to facilitate information exchange. The Company's metropolitan fiber network provides the foundation for its offerings. This all optical metropolitan network, combined with AboveNet's portfolio of integrated solutions, allow enterprise customers to rise above legacy networks to create truly customised networks that enable the real-time information exchange when and how it is needed.

This news release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Factors that could cause or contribute to such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, general economic and business conditions, competition, changes in technology and methods of marketing, and various other factors beyond the Company's control. This also includes such factors as are described from time to time in the SEC reports filed by the Company including the most recently filed Forms S-3, 10-K, 10-Q and 8-K.