Pittsburgh, PA (February 12, 2001)— MuniAuction, the Pittsburgh-based firm that pioneered Internet auctions of new bond issues, has changed its name to Grant Street Group. The new name reflects completion of the company's transition from an Internet auctioneer for new municipal bond issues to a unique application service provider (ASP) that both hosts Internet auctions of financial instruments and develops customized software to support auctions and administration of institutional sales and purchases of fixed-income financial instruments.
On December 12, 2000, the US Patent and Trademark Office issued the company a patent, giving the firm exclusive rights to conduct (or license its method of conducting) bond auctions and investment solicitations that have the following five characteristics:
1) an Issuer of securities, 2) selling or purchasing fixed income instruments over an electronic network, 3) using an auction (or "competitive sale") format, 4) with software that performs an interest cost calculation, 5) employing a web browser for inputting, computing, submitting or displaying data.
"Achieving two important milestones precipitated the decision to change our name: 1) reaching $1 trillion in cumulative auction volume last November, which represents 10% of total annual US bond issuance; and, 2) obtaining a patent on our auction methodology," said Myles Harrington, President and co-Founder of the company. He added, "As a consequence of these achievements, we are receiving inquiries every month from global financial institutions that are interested in trying new applications for our patented methodology that are supported by our software development and auction administration expertise."