On The Market:

BellSouth Corporation Selects Business Objects

Business Objects, a leading provider of business intelligence solutions, announced that BellSouth Corporation has selected the new analytic application framework from Business Objects for use in its network services group. The company purchased the BusinessObjects Application Foundation, a new analytic application framework that lets businesses quickly and easily develop powerful, integrated enterprise analytic applications.

BellSouth purchased the BusinessObjects Application Foundation to track, segment, and analyze the huge volume of data related to their network performance. This will allow BellSouth to maintain optimal network performance for their customers, including wholesale customers who depend on portions of BellSouth's telecommunications network to provide service to end users. BellSouth can leverage the powerful analytic engines built in to Application Foundation, to perform complex set-based analysis and time-series analysis. This will allow BellSouth Network Measurement managers to track key segments of network users, to make sure they are delivering the performance required.

"BellSouth's use of BusinessObjects Application Foundation demonstrates how the product's flexibility and integrated framework can be applied to address a specific business requirement," said Bernard Liautaud, president and CEO of Business Objects. "We look forward to working with BellSouth, a visionary and innovative company that is committed to serving and meeting the needs of their customers."

About BellSouth Corporation

BellSouth Corporation is a Fortune 100 communications services company headquartered in Atlanta, GA, serving more than 44 million customers in the United States and 16 other countries. Consistently recognized for customer satisfaction, BellSouth provides a full array of broadband data and to business customers, including Web hosting and other Internet services. In the residential market, BellSouth offers DSL high-speed Internet access, advanced voice features and other services. BellSouth also provides online and directory advertising services, including BellSouth RealPagesSM.com.

BellSouth owns 40 percent of Cingular Wireless, the nation's second largest wireless company, which provides innovative wireless data and voice services.

About Business Objects

Business Objects a leading provider of business intelligence (BI) solutions. Business intelligence lets organizations access, analyze, and share information internally with employees and externally with customers, suppliers, and partners. It helps organizations improve operational efficiency, build profitable customer relationships, and develop differentiated product offerings.

The company's products include BusinessObjects 2000, the industry's leading integrated business intelligence toolset and platform; and BusinessObjects Analytics, an integrated suite of enterprise analytic applications.

Business Objects pioneered the modern BI industry in 1990 by inventing a patented "semantic layer" that insulates users from the complexity of databases. In 1995, the company was first to focus on enterprise-scale BI deployments and today supports customers with more than 20,000 users. The company moved aggressively to the internet in 1997 by pioneering the market for BI extranets, a market that it continues to lead today. In 2000, the company delivered the industry's first interactive mobile BI solution. Today, Business Objects continues to innovate, creating and delivering a unique vision for enterprise analytic applications. Business Objects has more than 13,500 customers in over 80 countries. Business Objects can be reached at 408-953-6000 and www.businessobjects.com.

Contact Business Objects, Randy Cairns, 408-953-6036, randy.cairns@businessobjects.com.

AAA Carolinas Selects Brio Technology

Brio Technology Inc, a leading provider of business intelligence and analytic solutions, announced that AAA Carolinas, a not-for-profit affiliate of the American Automobile Association, has selected and deployed Brio Technology as its business intelligence solution for enabling access and distributing information to its key employees. Serving more than 1.4 million members in the Carolinas with travel, insurance, financial and auto-related services, AAA Carolinas needed to implement a robust, easy-to-use business intelligence solution that would allow seamless integration with its data warehouse and the ability for end-users to easily create queries and reports on their own. AAA Carolinas leverages the Brio Enterprise Decision Platform to allow its 700 employees, across 26 offices, covering their four distinct businesses to access, analyze and report on a multitude of data for both strategic planning and administrative purposes.

"We needed a business intelligence solution that would not only complement our new data warehouse, but would also offer the flexibility and scalability to extract data and turn it into actionable information," stated Maryanne Rayfield, CIO of AAA Carolinas. "Brio was the obvious choice due to its ease-of-use and quick deployment capabilities. Now we have a complete analytical view of our members, allowing us to take advantage of additional opportunities for targeted marketing campaigns, increased revenue and improved member satisfaction."

Recognizing the flexibility of Brio's solution, AAA Carolinas has evolved its use beyond the standard business intelligence and reporting applications to test and refine their data warehouse. By gathering information from both the operational systems and warehouse to check if data is loading accurately, AAA has saved countless hours and has allowed the warehouse to go into production much sooner than expected.

"An organization's ability to turn its investments into results is vital in today's business environment," said Don Beck, executive vice president, worldwide sales, Brio Technology. "Using Brio's solutions, AAA Carolinas noticed immediate increases in decision-maker productivity and significant cost saving, which are essential to the sustainability of not-for-profit organizations."

About AAA Carolinas

An affiliate of the American Automobile Association, AAA Carolinas is a not-for-profit organization serving more than 1.4 million members in the two Carolinas with travel, insurance, financial and auto related services.

About Brio Technology

Brio Technology provides a proven and reliable analytic software platform that enables companies to simplify the complex process of using corporate data to make better day-to-day decisions. Widely recognized as one of the easiest to use and deploy analytic platforms in the industry, the Brio Enterprise Decision Platform expands business intelligence beyond advanced query and analysis technologies to include powerful information delivery through enterprise-class reporting and executive dashboards. Used by more than half of the Fortune 100, Brio products empower individuals, workgroups and executives in an organization to find, access, share, manage, and exchange information with thousands of employees, partners and customers through an Internet-enabled enterprise. Founded in 1989, and headquartered in Santa Clara, CA, Brio products and services can be found around the globe at www.brio.com.

Contact Mark Peterson of Brio Technology Inc, 408-496-7754, or mark.peterson@brio.com.

Visible Markets/CMS BondEdge Announce Strategic Alliance

Visible Markets Inc, the world's first browser-based auction marketplace for mortgage-backed securities, asset-backed securities and investment-grade corporates, and CMS BondEdge, creator of the BondEdge system for fixed income portfolio analytics, announced plans to link their respective systems. The initiative unites a leading fixed income electronic trading platform with a recognized leader in fixed income analytical software to provide a direct connection between portfolio analysis and online trading.

Under this agreement, CMS BondEdge and Visible Markets are developing connections between their respective platforms, BondEdge and the Visible Marketplace.

BondEdge clients will benefit from access to Visible Markets' current market information through the BondEdge Private Client Site. They will also be able to transmit orders, indications of interest, and portfolio information to the Visible Marketplace. When BondEdge clients conduct "what-if" analyses on a portfolio, the resulting buy or sell recommendations can be routed seamlessly to the Visible Marketplace as indications of interest or firm orders. By synchronizing their portfolios with Visible Markets, BondEdge users can receive anonymous notification of interest in their bonds through the Visible Markets instant messaging system and participate in a dialogue that leads to a trade.

Laurie Adami, president of CMS BondEdge, commented, "Our alliance with Visible Markets represents an important step in our effort to provide BondEdge clients with convenient access to online fixed income trading and the ability to perform portfolio analyses using executable bonds. Visible Markets is a key, strategic partner for us in that they focus heavily on the mortgage-backed securities and corporate markets, both of which are critical to BondEdge clients."

"We are excited to offer our customers the ability to link their portfolio analysis tools with the Visible Markets trading system," said Bill Martin, vice president of Marketing at Visible Markets. "The partnership between CMS BondEdge and Visible Markets unites over 550 buy-side and sell-side institutions in an online community to anonymously exchange indications of interest and execute trades."

About Visible Markets Inc

Visible Markets Inc is the world's first browser-based auction marketplace for commercial mortgage-backed securities, mortgage-backed securities, asset-backed securities and investment-grade corporates. Visible Markets has created an open, price-transparent Internet-based marketplace that increases the flow of information and liquidity in the bond markets. Visible Markets' client base consists of over 200 institutional accounts, including over 30 dealers.

In conjunction with funding from Greylock Partners, eSpeed and State Street Corporation, Visible Markets also received backing from several prominent Wall Street angel investors. Visible Markets, a registered broker-dealer and a member of the National Association of Securities Dealers Inc, is headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts. More information about Visible Markets is available at www.visiblemarkets.com.

About CMS BondEdge

For over 20 years, CMS BondEdge has been recognized as a leader in fixed income analytical software. Long known for the BondEdge system, CMS BondEdge is trusted as an independent source of research, analytics and valuation tools by over 500 institutions in the U.S. and Canada. CMS BondEdge is an affiliate of FT Interactive Data, a leading source of global securities information. Both CMS BondEdge and FT Interactive Data are divisions of Interactive Data Corporation, a global provider of securities pricing, financial information, and analytics tools to institutional and individual investors. More information on CMS BondEdge is available at www.cmsbondedge.com. Corporate information on Interactive Data Corporation is available at www.interactivedatacorp.com.

Contact Visible Markets Inc, Andrea Maasik, 617-753-8528, amaasik@visiblemarkets.com.

Columbia House Selects Coremetrics

The Columbia House Company, one of the world's largest direct marketers of music, DVD and video home entertainment products, and Coremetrics Inc, a leading provider of data-driven business intelligence solutions, announced that Columbia House has selected Coremetrics to provide customized analysis of online customer behavior for Columbiahouse.com's popular music, DVD and video entertainment clubs. Coremetrics' business intelligence solutions will enable Columbia House to increase advertising effectiveness, maximize direct marketing efforts, and improve Web site usability.

"The Columbia House Company's selection of Coremetrics is a real triumph for our company and a strong vote of confidence for the compelling value of our business intelligence solutions," said Scott Kauffman, president and CEO of Coremetrics. "Intimate knowledge of customer behavior is critical for companies striving to improve customer interactions and predict buying habits. Our business intelligence solutions provide highly customizable data capture and intelligent business analysis which enable sophisticated direct marketers such as Columbia House to run their business more efficiently."

Coremetrics' Core Data Platform and Coremetrics' eLuminate Commerce will allow Columbiahouse.com to measure the success of online advertising campaigns, enhance user experience, and determine the most valuable affiliate relationships. Columbia House will use eLuminate Commerce and customized reports from Coremetrics to analyze the click-stream patterns of customers to ensure that the online browsing and buying experience is efficient and rewarding. eLuminate Commerce is an award-winning Web analytics service that provides dynamic segmentation, allowing Columbiahouse.com to better understand their customers based on any number of variables and generate highly targeted promotions.

"Much of our Internet strategy is reliant upon highly targeted advertising and promotions," said Bill Ostroff, president of Columbiahouse.com. "The in-depth analysis and customized reporting that Coremetrics provides will enable us to invest marketing dollars more effectively and reduce the cost of doing business. At the same time we expect that the insights provided by this analysis will enhance our ability to fine tune our online promotions and Web site design to better match the interests of our club members and prospects."

"We selected Coremetrics because they offer unparalleled analytics and customized reporting about the preferences of our online audience," said Warren Clamen, vice president finance of Columbiahouse.com. "We plan to leverage this valuable information to improve the online customer experience, and provide better services for our loyal club members."

Coremetrics Business Intelligence Solutions

Coremetrics' business intelligence solutions consist of a Core Data Platform and a Web analytics service, eLuminate Commmerce. Coremetrics' Core Data Platform is a data warehouse of comprehensive and accurate online customer behavior for analysis using eLuminate Commerce, custom reporting by Coremetrics, and integration with third-party CRM and data mining applications. eLuminate Commerce is an award-winning Web analytics service that enables companies to understand customer behavior and make informed business decisions that decrease customer acquisition costs, increase customer retention and improve browser-to-buyer conversion ratios. eLuminate Commerce extracts granular customer data from the Core Data Platform to deliver business analysis that allows companies to quickly create customer segments, maximize marketing ROI, and improve online merchandising. Coremetrics' business intelligence solutions are complemented by a professional services team that delivers tailored data capture services, customized reporting and in-depth analysis that allow businesses to improve customer relationships within the online channel and across the enterprise.

About Coremetrics

Founded in May 1999, Coremetrics is a provider of data-driven business intelligence solutions that enable companies to improve interactions with their customers based on a complete understanding of online behavior. Coremetrics' data capture, storage and decision-support services provide a complete model of customer interaction online that is extensible for enterprise-wide use with third party Customer Relationship Management and data mining applications. Coremetrics' customers include The Columbia House Company, Hanover Direct, Sundance Catalog Company, Walmart.com and Wilsons Leather. Coremetrics is headquartered in San Francisco, California, with research and development offices in Austin, Texas. The company is privately held with funding from Accel Partners, General Catalyst and Highland Capital Partners. To learn more about Coremetrics, visit the company's Web site at www.coremetrics.com or call 877-721-CORE.

About Columbia House

The Columbia House Company is one of the world's largest direct marketers of music, videos and DVD home entertainment products. With more than 16 million offline and online club members in the United States, Canada and Mexico, the company provides direct-to-consumer marketing of more than 12,000 music titles and 7,000 video and DVD titles through its entertainment clubs. The company's Web site, www.columbiahouse.com, is one of the premier e-commerce brands and consistently ranks among the Web's top 10 retail sites, and is a leading online advertiser. Since its inception in 1955, The Columbia House Company has a proven record of excellence in database marketing, market segmentation, credit screening and niche market merchandising. Headquartered in New York City, The Columbia House Company is a general partnership owned equally by Sony Corporation and AOL Time Warner Inc.

Contact Emily Brady of McLean Public Relations, 650-685-3850 x106, or eb@mcleanpr.com, for Coremetrics Inc.

Aspirity and EssPro BI Firms Merge

Aspirity, LP and EssPro Inc announced that they have merged their respective organizations. The name of the merged company is Aspirity LLC.

EssPro is a Seattle based consulting firm providing business intelligence solutions to Northwest companies including Frank Russell, PACCAR, and Microsoft. Aspirity is a national consulting and training company specializing in Microsoft business intelligence solutions with offices in Seattle, Chicago and New York. Aspirity's clients include Harley Davidson, Memorial Healthcare System and Microsoft.

The newly combined company will deliver world-class business intelligence consulting and training services. Capable of delivering end-to-end solutions, Aspirity LLC combines technical expertise, formal training, and in-depth applications experience, providing clients a full range of services. The company enjoys alliance relationships with the leading business intelligence technology vendors including; Microsoft, Hyperion Solutions, IBM, Business Objects, Cognos, and ProClarity.

"Merging with Aspirity is a strategic move for us," said Mike Luckevich, EssPro's president. "By combining our consulting talent with Aspirity's training capability and national infrastructure, companies anywhere in the U.S. can get a complete solution to their business intelligence needs." Mr. Luckevich will be Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the new company.

"There is a strong education component to every successful consulting engagement -- so the merger of Aspirity and EssPro is a natural fit. It allows us to provide customers with value added solutions that span from training to implementation," said Hilary Feier, who was president of the former Aspirity organization, will be president and Chief Operating Officer of the newly formed company.

"This combination makes a lot of sense," said John Eng, Microsoft SQL Server, Lead Product Manager. "We've worked closely with EssPro and Aspirity over the past couple of years. Both of these firms have proven themselves as valuable partners with a deep understanding of our customers and their need for Microsoft products, technologies and solutions."

The current management team and employees of both organizations will remain in place in the new organization. The new company's headquarters is located in Seattle. The company's telephone is: 425-519-3777 and the Website is www.aspirity.com.

Contact Aspirity, Hilary Feier, 425-519-3777 x230, hfeier@asperity.com.

SPSS Inc and Siebel Systems Announce Strategic Alliance

SPSS Inc, a worldwide provider of analytical technology, and Siebel Systems, Inc, a leading provider of eBusiness applications software, announced that SPSS has joined the Siebel Alliance Program as a Strategic Software Partner. As part of the alliance, SPSS will integrate its customer-focused analytical solutions and products with Siebel eBusiness Applications.

Siebel Systems provides an integrated family of eBusiness applications software enabling multi-channel sales, marketing and customer service systems to be deployed over the Web, call centers, field, reseller channels, retail and dealer networks. SPSS provides advanced analytical technology that drives decision-making and improves business performance by profiling and predicting customer behavior. SPSS analytical solutions and products will be integrated and validated with Siebel eBusiness Applications to support enhanced customer segmentation and more effective targeting for outbound marketing campaigns, and for real-time environments such as call centers and Web sites.

"Together, Siebel Systems and SPSS offer a best-in-class solution that will allow our joint customers to dramatically improve their ability to understand and service their customers," said Steve Garnett, vice president of alliances at Siebel Systems. "The potential benefits are substantial, including increased customer retention and higher customer profitability."

CustomerCentric Solutions and SPSS BI, divisions of SPSS, will work with Siebel Systems to deliver integrated solutions to horizontal and vertical markets including Financial Services, Telecommunications, Retail and Healthcare. ShowCase, a division of SPSS, and a leader in business intelligence products for the IBM iSeries eServer 400 market, will work with Siebel Systems to deliver integrated solutions for the mid-market.

The integration of Siebel eBusiness Applications with SPSS analytical solutions and products, including CustomerCentric and Clementine, will enable companies to better target, acquire, manage and maximize customer relationships across all channels by significantly improving customer segmentation and offer targeting. The models created in SPSS will enable a marketer to better target customers by enabling the marketer to deliver the right offer to the right customer at the right time. This capability will be provided through packaged predictive models for real-time personalization and offer targeting, and a broad range of Web analytics integrating online user behavior and activity data with customer data from other channels.

CustomerCentric is a comprehensive and technologically advanced analytical Customer Relationship Management solution that will enable joint customers to use packaged predictive models to minimize risk as well as maximize revenue, ROI and Lifetime Value. For customers preferring to develop their own predictive models, SPSS offers an array of data mining and analysis products including Clementine, the award-winning data mining workbench. SPSS will integrate these products with Siebel eBusiness Applications, including Siebel Marketing, Siebel Call Center, Siebel Interactive Selling Suite and Siebel Sales.

"We are delighted to be able to offer the market a blend of unmatched expertise in analytical solutions together with the leading supplier of customer-focused eBusiness solutions," said Sue Phelan, president, CustomerCentric Solutions, a division of SPSS Inc.

The scope of the alliance includes joint development, joint marketing and collaborative sales programs, including targeted field sales efforts on key accounts.

About SPSS Inc

SPSS Inc, headquartered in Chicago, IL, USA, is a worldwide provider of analytical technology for business, government, and higher education. The company's solutions and products enable customers to make better decisions by learning from the past, understanding the present and anticipating the future. With this insight, organizations gain a true competitive advantage: the ability to manage the future. SPSS analytical technology is brought to the market through five divisions: CustomerCentric Solutions (for integrated analytical CRM solutions); SPSS BI (for data mining and statistical products and services used to solve business problems); ShowCase (for analytical products operating on IBM iSeries/AS400 platform); SPSS MR (for analytical solutions in the market research industry); and SPSS Enabling Technologies (for licensing SPSS technologies for use in other analytical applications). For more information, visit www.spss.com.

About Siebel Systems

Siebel Systems Inc is a leading provider of eBusiness applications software. Siebel Systems provides an integrated family of eBusiness application software enabling multichannel sales, marketing and customer service systems to be deployed over the Web, call centers, field, reseller channels, retail and dealer networks. Siebel System's sales and service facilities are deployed locally in more than 37 countries. For more information, please visit our Web site at www.siebel.com.

Contact SPSS Public Relations/SPSS Inc, MaryEllen Hartigan, 800-525-4980, mhartigan@spss.com.

Viaken and InforSense to Deliver Enterprise DM Solutions

Viaken Systems Inc (Viaken), an end-to-end informatics solution provider for the biotechnology and pharmaceutical markets, and InforSense, a provider of enterprisewide e-science and e-business platforms, announced that they are developing a marketing and distribution partnership for the Kensington data mining and visualization suite in the life science domain. The Kensington suite will be offered by Viaken as part of its set of hosted solutions and professional services products. Kensington customers will benefit from Viaken's expertise in the design, deployment, and management of fully integrated end-to-end research informatics solutions.

Kensington is an Internet-based knowledge management platform for the analysis of life science research data, supporting automated discovery and collaborative research. The system combines data mining and analytical functions, visualization tools, collaborative work support, and intellectual property management functions within an integrated, extensible, and scalable framework. The system also facilitates the presentation and deployment of scientific discoveries across a company intranet.

"Viaken has deep experience in delivering complex informatics solutions to life science companies. Viaken's state-of-the-art infrastructure enables Kensington to be delivered to a wide range of life science companies from the largest pharmaceutical businesses to smaller biotechs, which makes Viaken an ideal distribution channel for the Kensington system," said Prof. Yike Guo, CEO of InforSense. "In particular, Viaken's experience with large scale integration of complex research data will allow Kensington customers to analyze a wider range of information to extract significant additional value."

"The Kensington system provides the type of high-end enterprise scale data mining and visualization system that is required to manage and interpret the large volumes of complex data that are generated by today's drug discovery processes," said Dr. Steve Gardner, Viaken's vice president and chief technical officer. "Kensington enables researchers to make more rapid and accurate decisions about R&D projects using a full range of statistical analysis and data mining tools. The automation and collaborative research framework offered by Kensington is a very powerful mechanism for improving R&D productivity."

About InforSense

InforSense is a leading infrastructure software provider for knowledge discovery and management in the areas of e-science and e-business. InforSense is a spin-off from the long-established Data Mining Research Group, affiliated to the Parallel Computing Centre at Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, London, UK. InforSense's products, the Kensington series, provide powerful platforms, incorporating a unique combination of a scalable Internet-based architecture, scalable data mining technology, dynamic knowledge management and interactive visualization technology, as well as the ability to develop domain specific extensions. For more information on InforSense, visit www.inforsense.com or call +44 (0)20 7594 6817.

About Viaken

Viaken Systems is a premier end-to-end informatics solutions provider, offering enabling solutions for biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and agricultural research and development. Viaken provides a range of informatics solutions including hosting of research applications and databases, strategic research informatics services, High Performance Computing, and primary user support to its customers in the life sciences. The company also provides Professional Services and strategic consulting services to its customers to design, implement and manage scalable informatics platforms tailored to their specific needs. For more information on Viaken, visit www.viaken.com or call 1-877-2VIAKEN.

Contact Karen Higgins of TMP Worldwide, 610-251-6880, karen.higgins@tmp.com, for Viaken Systems Inc.