JMP Securities Announces Exclusive Distribution Agreement with Nemertes Research
Nemertes' Assessment of Marketplace and Technology Trends to Complement JMP's Equity Research Product

SAN FRANCISCO, March 28, 2005 - JMP Securities LLC, a research-driven, full- service investment bank serving growth companies and their investors, announced today that it has reached an exclusive agreement to distribute the technology focused market analysis and commentary produced by independent research firm Nemertes Research.

Nemertes Research specializes in analyzing and quantifying the business impact of technology. Nemertes develops quantitative benchmarks of technology value and cost- effectiveness, yielding proprietary data on the economic, strategic and operational effects of emerging information technologies. By making Nemertes' unbiased, fact-based insight available to institutional investors, JMP provides clients additional context with which to make investment decisions.

"JMP's arrangement with Nemertes is another way that JMP can provide value to institutional customers," said Jim Wilson, JMP Securities' co-director of research. "JMP has built an institutional client base by anticipating sector-specific trends and producing actionable investment ideas for equity investors. By accompanying our own research with an additional source of informed views on the technology marketplace, JMP is offering its clients another way to identify stocks that may be poised for significant growth due to factors not widely recognized or fully understood by many investors."

Per the terms of the agreement, JMP is the sole financial institution with distribution rights to Nemertes' published research. However, JMP has no editorial control over Nemertes' content. Moreover, Nemertes has no financial stake in any of the companies that it analyzes and conducts no investment activities of its own, further safeguarding the objectivity of its research.

Nemertes conducts primary research into technology assessment, selection, deployment and operation by regularly questioning a network of more than 3,000 IT executives about their IT budgeting, spending priorities and purchasing decisions. As a result, Nemertes is able to assess emerging technologies of present and future interest to executives that have the potential to change the way enterprises do business.

Nemertes' four principals - Johna Till Johnson, Robin Gareiss, Melanie Turek and Andreas M. Antonopoulos - each have between 15 and 20 years of experience in operational, engineering and analytical roles in the technology industry and bring their expertise to their analysis of technology integration, networking and communications equipment, infrastructure and enterprise applications, servers, systems and security.

About Nemertes Research

Nemertes Research specializes in quantifying the business impact of emerging information technologies. For more information, visit www.nemertes.com, write to research@nemertes.com or call Chris Zimmerman at (888) 241-2685.

JMP Securities LLC is a full-service investment bank providing equity research, institutional brokerage and investment banking services to public and private growth companies and their investors. Headquartered in San Francisco, JMP Securities serves five industries that exhibit above-average long-term growth characteristics: Technology, Healthcare, Consumer, Financial Services and Business Services. For more information, visit www.jmpsecurities.com.

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