Royal Bank Signs Agreement With Information Builders

Information Builders, a global leader in the combined Web reporting and enterprise integration solutions known as i-business, announced an enterprise agreement with Royal Bank of Canada that gives the bank broad access to Information Builders' offerings of enterprise integration and business intelligence products, which will be used to develop additional Web-enabled customer service and decision-support applications.

The five-year multimillion-dollar agreement cements a long relationship between Royal Bank, Canada's premier financial institution and Information Builders. Many of the bank's units, including those responsible for risk management, mortgages, human resources, card services, and mutual funds, are already using Information Builders products for enterprise integration and business intelligence applications that have been instrumental in maintaining the bank's extraordinary record of customer service, efficiency and growth.

"Information Builders software has already earned a prominent place as the enterprise reporting standard for many of our business groups. We believe their products can be used more broadly, to give our users and customers unequaled enterprise integration and business intelligence capabilities," said Irene Sobolewski, vice president of Project Support and Information Management in Royal Bank's Systems and Technology Group.

"We're delighted to have Canada's most trusted financial institution as an enterprise partner," said Brian Joynt, General Manager of Information Builders' Canadian Region. "Royal Bank's long-term plan to use our products to build exciting, new, world-class applications is a solid vote of confidence in our role as an enterprise integration and business intelligence company."

The agreement gives the bank the ability to employ Information Builders' business intelligence technology (WebFOCUS) and its enterprise integration middleware (EDA) on mainframes across the enterprise. This technology will be used to build a suite of Web-enabled management and end-user applications accessible to Royal Bank employees and customers at the company's 1,500 branches and offices in 30 countries.

The agreement also offers the bank the opportunity to use a variety of new technologies, such as transparent access to any data source in the bank through Microsoft Office 2000. EDA, Information Builders' enterprise integration middleware product, can also be combined with emerging enterprise data exchange standards, such as XML, to deliver customized reports for new mobile devices such as Palm Pilots, pagers and cellular phones.

About Royal Bank

Royal Bank of Canada is a diversified global financial services group with assets of more than CDN$273 billion. It is a leading provider of personal, and commercial banking, investment and trust services, insurance, corporate and investment banking, online banking and transaction-based services including custody. The group has 50,000 employees, who serve 10 million personal, business and public sector customers in 30 countries. For additional company information, please visit www.royalbank.com.

About Information Builders

Information Builders supplies market-leading Web business intelligence and enterprise integration solutions. The combined strengths of these core technologies provide organizations with the ability to dynamically transform all of their data into valuable business information. This information can be distributed immediately via the Web to customers, employees and partners throughout the world. This unique and comprehensive solution known as i-business makes dynamic, scalable and cost-effective e-business applications possible.

Headquartered in New York City, Information Builders is one the largest independently owned software companies in the world with more than 5,000 customer sites, including 90 of the Fortune 100 currently using its core technologies. The company employs more than 1,950 professionals worldwide and generated revenues exceeding $340 million in 1999. To learn more about Information Builders' products and services, point your Web browser to www.informationbuilders.com.

Contact Michael Ventriello of Information Builders, 917-339-6099 michael_ventriello@ibi.com.