ASX 50 Companies' Websites Fall Short

Testing reveals slow loading and poor uptime; Wesfarmers Limited noted as worst

Amsterdam, The Netherlands – March 4, 2010 – WatchMouse, a global industry leader in self-service website and application performance monitoring, tested the 50 websites belonging to the companies listed on the ASX 50, the benchmark stock market index of Australia’s stocks listed on the Australian Stock Exchange, for availability and performance. Only one of the ASX 50 company websites registered 100% uptime. The websites with the lowest uptimes included Wesfarmers Limited (41.9%), Crown Limited (71.1%) and Woolworths Limited (93.4%). The websites with the best uptimes included Macquarie Group Limited (100%), Rio Tinto Limited (99.9%), Wespac Banking Corporation (99.9%), Worleyparsons Limited (99.9%), Macquarie Airports (99.9%), QBE Insurance Group Limited (99.9%), Leighton Holdings Limited (99.9%), AGL Energy Limited (99.9%), Transurban Group (99.9%) and National Australia Bank Limited (99.9%).

“These are the largest public companies in Australia and only ten of their websites met the industry standard of 99.9% uptime or greater, and Wesfarmers with only 41% uptime is abysmal,” states Mark Pors, CTO and co-founder of WatchMouse. “These websites are key channels for these companies to attract new business, provide investors with information, and project a professional corporate image. It's been two years since our first testing, and we’re surprised that our research found that these sites are fairing only marginally better than they did in 2008.”

WatchMouse monitored the websites during the period of January 22 to February 28, 2010. According to industry standards, availability of greater than or equal to 99.9% is regarded as “good” while anything below 99% is regarded as “poor” site uptime.

The sites were checked every five minutes during the test period from one of the 42 WatchMouse global monitoring stations, and included a retrieval of the website home page, without graphics or frames. The home page was expected to load within eight seconds without any errors. If that time was exceeded or a server error occurred, WatchMouse verified the results using another of its monitoring stations. The result was counted as either poor availability or unavailable if a second error was established.

Click here to read the full report of all ASX 50 company website uptimes or visit http://asx50.public-website-status.comfor real-time status and statistical data on each website’s performance.

This website performance monitoring research covers the websites of the following organisations: MQG (Macquarie Group Limited), RIO (Rio Tinto Limited), WBC (Westpac Banking Corporation Limited), WOR (Worleyparsons Limited), MAP (Macquarie Airports), QBE (QBE Insurance Group Limited), LEI (Leighton Holdings Limited), AGK (AGL Energy Limited), TCL (Transurban Group), NAB (National Australia Bank Limited), CFX (CFS Retail Property Trust), IAG (Insurance Australia Group Limited), NWS (News Corporation), FGL (Foster's Group Limited), TOL (Toll Holdings Limited), ASX (ASX Limited), MIG (Macquarie Infrastructure Group), QAN (Qantas Airways Limited), SGP (Stockland), BSL (Bluescope Steel Limited), SHL (Sonic Healthcare Limited), CCL (Coca-Cola Amatil Limited), FMG (Fortescue Metals Group Ltd), CSL (CSL Limited), GPT (GPT Group), BXB (Brambles Industries Limited), SUN (Suncorp-Metway Limited), CBA (Commonwealth Bank of Australia Limited), NCM (Newcrest Mining Limited), STO (Santos Limited), OSH (Oil Search Limited), ANZ (Australia and New Zealand Banking Group), BHP (BHP Billiton Limited), OST (Onesteel Limited), TLS (Telstra Corporation Limited), WDC (Westfield Group), AMP (AMP Limited), TEL (Telecom Corporation Of New Zealand Limited), IPL (Incitec Pivot Limited), ORG (Origin Energy Limited), LGL (Lihir Gold Limited), ORI (Orica Limited), AXA (AXA Asia Pacific Holdings Limited), AMC (Amcor Limited), LLC (Lend Lease Corporation Limited), TAH (Tabcorp Holdings Limited), WPL (Woodside Petroleum Limited), WOW (Woolworths Limited), CWN (Crown Limited), WES (Wesfarmers Limited).

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