[announce] KBC Group NV Selects Arbortext to Enhance Banking andInsurance Services Applications

[Beth Ambaruch <bea@arbortext.com>]

KBC Group NV Selects Arbortext to Enhance Banking and Insurance Services
Applications

Leading European Financial Institution to Implement Arbortext’s
Multichannel Publishing Software

ANN ARBOR, Mich., July 15, 2002 -- Arbortext, Inc., the only global
provider of XML-based multichannel publishing software, today announced
that KBC Group NV (SWX: KDB) has chosen Arbortext’s Epic Editor software
and Epic E-Content Engine publishing engine to enhance its banking and
insurance services applications.  The KBC Group is a leading European
financial institution employing approximately 43,000 people worldwide,
including over 900 European branch offices throughout Belgium, France,
Netherlands, Luxembourg, Ireland, Hungary and the Czech Republic.   This
initiative will establish an enterprise-wide system to collaborate,
create and publish core business documents from the branch offices to
provide customers with fresh, relevant banking and insurance summaries.

“KBC chose Arbortext for its unmatched ability to create multi-language,
multi-channel customized content,” said Luc Provoost, IT Department
Manager, Insurance and Prestudies for KBC.  “Arbortext enabled us to
deploy an enterprise solution that could be used to create high quality,
client oriented documents for multiple output channels.  Arbortext
allows us to deploy an enterprise solution that could be used
simultaneously by 6,000 people to create daily summaries of banking
transactions as well as publish general conditions of insurance
contracts to our customers.”

Accenture, one of the world’s leading consulting firms, worked closely
with Arbortext and KBC to design and implement a system that supports
the efficient creation and management of over 12.5 million pages of core
business documents.  Specifically, the system architecture is comprised
of the following:
·	Arbortext Epic Editor.  Used to develop the authoring application for
various banking and insurance products as well as using a web-based
template for the online creation and publishing through a web browser.
·	Documentum Adapter.  Through a tight integration with Epic Editor,
authors can connect to the Documentum Enterprise Content platform to
manage content created using Epic Editor.
·	Epic E-Content Engine (E3).  E3 supplements Documentum content
management servers and the IBM WebSphere server to automatically
assemble and publish core business documents from a single XML source to
print, intranet, Web and HTML.

As a result of this implementation, KBC expects to reduce the time for
delivering new products, decrease the costs of document production, and
support multiple formats of content and page layout for French, German,
Dutch and English.

“The KBC Group will continue to strengthen its leadership role by
focusing its employees to deliver strategic value to its customers,”
said Edwin van der Ouderaa, Financial Services Director for Accenture
BeLux.  “Accenture’s consulting and implementation expertise will help
accelerate the implementation of this enhanced solution.”

“Arbortext is pleased to work with the KBC Group to enhance its banking
and insurance applications,” said Nathan Birtle, European Regional Vice
President of Sales for Arbortext.  “Successful organizations like KBC
understand the importance of improving information quality by using
multichannel publishing as a strategic opportunity to cut costs.”


About KBC
The KBC Bank & Insurance Group is one of the largest financial groups in
Belgium, offering a complete range of financial products and services to
its clients, whether private persons, institutions or corporations.
Formed in June 1998 after the merger of Kredietbank, a retail and
corporate bank, CERA Bank, a co-operative bank, and ABB, an insurance
company, KBC is present today in more than 30 countries and has more
than 43,000 employees worldwide.   For more information please visit
http://www.kbc.com.

About Accenture
Accenture is the world's leading management consulting and technology
services organization. Through its network of businesses approach – in
which the company enhances its consulting and outsourcing expertise
through alliances, affiliated companies and other capabilities –
Accenture delivers innovations that help clients across all industries
quickly realize their visions. With more than 75,000 people in 47
countries, the company generated net revenues of $11.44 billion for the
fiscal year ended August 31, 2001. For more information please visit
http://www.accenture.com.

About Arbortext
Arbortext is the only global provider of XML-based multichannel software
that enables the creation, editing and publishing of information to
multiple media types – Web, print, CD-ROM, wireless – from a single
source of content.  Shipping since 1991, Arbortext’s standards-based
software supports technical publishing, reference publishing and catalog
publishing applications that enable enterprises to provide more
accurate, cost-efficient, complete, timely, consistent and usable
information on all media. Arbortext’s software is installed at over 300
large multinational organizations. Current customers include American
Express Financial Services, Audi, Boeing, British Aerospace,
Caterpillar, DaimlerChrysler, Ericsson Telecom, Ford, General Electric,
GM, IBM, International Thomson Publishing, Lucent, Nokia, Nortel
Networks, PeopleSoft, Pfizer, Qantas, Ricoh, Sun Microsystems, United
Airlines, Volkswagen, Volvo and West Group. Arbortext is a founding
member and active participant in the XML Activity of the World Wide Web
Consortium (W3C). Headquartered in Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA, Arbortext
has offices around the world.  For more information please visit
http://www.arbortext.com.
# # #

Contact: 	Beth Ambaruch 				Hugh Burnham
	  	Arbortext, Inc.				Phase Two Strategies
	  	+1 734.327.6014				+1 212.530.7541
	 	bea@arbortext.com				hburnham@p2pr.com

		Nathan Birtle
		Arbortext, Inc.
		+44.207.559.3474
		nbirtle@arbortext.com