Classified Ventures,
Owner of cars.com,
Acquires Marketdrive Interactive

Acquisition Enables Significant Customer Relationship Offerings

CHICAGO, April 27, 2000 Classified Ventures, Inc., owner of cars.com and three real estate Web sites, today announced it has agreed to acquire Marketdrive Interactive, Inc., a leader in Internet-based customer relationship management solutions for the automotive industry. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed. Classified Ventures, a fast-growing Internet company that creates e-marketplaces for consumers and the automotive and real estate industry trade, announced an initial minority investment in Marketdrive at the National Association of Automobile Dealers annual trade show in January.

"Our acquisition of Marketdrive underscores we are serious about competing in the B-to-B end of the automotive retail industry," said David G. Israel, president and chief executive officer of Classified Ventures. "We see a significant market opportunity for cars.com to provide automotive retailers with best of breed tools that increase sales and enhance post-purchase relationships with their customers. Also, we now have a platform to develop similar customer relationship management products for other vertical businesses at Classified Ventures."

Marketdrive Interactive, based in the San Francisco Bay area, specializes in Internet-based customer relationship management solutions for manufacturers and retailers of automobiles and other vehicles. Marketdrive powers customer relationship management tools for BMW of North America, Inc., Subaru of America, Inc., cars.com, and several large automotive retailers.

"We developed the Marketdrive technology to help vehicle retailers use the Internet as a powerful tool to re-intermediate with their customers and develop long term, one-to-one marketing opportunities," said Rob MacNaughton, president and chief financial officer of Marketdrive. MacNaughton and his partner, Thomas Jung, chief executive officer of Marketdrive, will join Classified Ventures and continue to develop the market for products and services based on Marketdrive technology.

Cars.com recently introduced CustomerCenter based on Marketdrive’s customer relationship management technology. CustomerCenter allows Web-enabled communication between automotive retailers and their customers through a personalized Web page. "Marketdrive Interactive is the first mover and technology leader in providing relationship management tools to the automotive industry," said Mitch Golub, senior vice president, product development and marketing for Classified Ventures and acting general manager of cars.com. "Cars.com has experienced rapid customer adoption of the CustomerCenter product and we expect sales of that product to accelerate. Over the next year, cars.com will introduce an entire suite of dealer management tools to enhance dealer productivity."

About cars.com
Cars.com simplifies local new and used car shopping on the Internet. With Inventory in 26 of the top 30 U.S. markets, cars.com is the only automotive Web site to provide daily updates of dealer inventories. Cars.com allows consumers to search vehicle listings by zip code, vehicle make, model and year and easily submit a quote request to a car dealer by e-mail, fax or telephone. In addition to vehicle pricing, cars.com provides consumers with trusted automotive information, including rich editorial content pertaining to real-life issues such as how to purchase a vehicle and tips for parents of young drivers. The site also provides consumers with tools such as an auto loan calculator, news and reports on new and used vehicles, more than 3,500 independent vehicle reviews (from 1983 to the present), vehicle performance data and vehicle recall information. Cars.com is owned by Classified Ventures, the largest Internet company based in Chicago.

About Classified Ventures
Classified Ventures, Inc. provides nationally branded online services in the classified advertising market place that build upon the capabilities and local expertise of its national affiliate network of more than 130 newspapers. The company currently operates the national Web sites Apartments.com™, www.apartments.com, cars.com™, www.cars.com, Moving Center™, www.movingcenter.com and NewHomeNetwork.com™, www.newhomenetwork.com. Classified Ventures, Inc. also operates HomeHunter™, a local resale real estate service.

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