DETROIT, Mich., July 17, 2000

 The Open Applications Group, Inc. (OAGi) today announced that eight of the world’s leading Internet business-to-business (B2B) technology companies successfully joined forces to demonstrate a multi-vendor, multi-platform automotive supply chain ¾ based on OAGi’s B2B standards ¾ at Ford Motor Company’s e2K Process Leadership Exposition. This demonstration showed how companies such as Ford and its partners can use OAGi standards to create e-commerce supply chains that foster unprecedented operational efficiency and business agility.

“The participating vendors did an excellent job at replicating an actual automotive supply chain, with various external suppliers integrating seamlessly with Ford’s own manufacturing operations,” said OAGi Vice President Bill Harrelson, who is also chief technology officer for B2B systems integrator Canopy International, which integrated the eight participants’ systems into a collaborative supply chain for the Ford event in one day. “The e2K demonstration proves that the OAGi has the most mature and viable B2B standards for the automotive industry.”

The OAGi is a non-profit consortium focused on developing standards that promote business software interoperability.  The demonstration at the Ford e2K event was the first leg of the “OAGi Vendor Challenge,” a program sponsored by members of OAGi’s Customer Council, which includes companies such as AT&T Wireless, Boeing, Ford, DHL and Lockheed-Martin. The goal of the Vendor Challenge is to focus software vendors on creating “plug and play” B2B  e-commerce interoperability by implementing OAGi standards.

Technology providers that have committed to participate in the OAGi Vendor Challenge are demonstrating their open B2B solutions at Customer Council events, the first of which was Ford e2K. This event was a precursor to a significantly larger event, the OAGi Vendor Challenge, Nov. 1-2 at Canopy International’s e-business integration laboratory in Boston. More than 24 vendors have committed to that event.

At the Ford e2K show, eight B2B vendors successfully built and demonstrated an automobile engine supply chain. The supply chain represented multiple steps in the process ¾ from tool procurement through delivery of products to Ford warehouses ¾ and involved multiple exchanges of business documents, such as purchase orders, between machine tools companies, equipment manufacturers, warehouses and Ford itself.

“Standards bodies such as the OAGi are vital to the future of B2B commerce, because they allow companies to communicate using a common business language,” said Chris Stone, president and CEO of Tilion, whose “in-the-net” commerce analytics provided on-demand, holistic views of activity within the supply chain, enabling Ford to optimize operations with suppliers, partners and distributors. “This eliminates the need for companies to implement expensive custom interfaces between systems, which greatly reduces the technical barrier to entry for companies seeking to reap the benefits of B2B commerce. From Tilion’s standpoint, OAGi standards also enable companies to perform on-demand B2B analytics directly from business transactions, thus enabling companies to optimize operations across the entire supply chain.”

In addition to Canopy International and Tilion vendors participating in the supply chain included Killdara, eXcelon Corporation, irista, Mercator, PSDI and Teklogix.

“Mercator is proud to be a part of the OAGi and Ford e2K demo and to align ourselves with OAGi's mission to drive business software interoperability standards,” said Dave Power, vice president of marketing at Mercator.  “Part and parcel of this is the need for any-to-any integration as a key to success for any supply chain initiative.  We are pleased that Mercator is a part of this demonstration and look forward to continuing our work with OAGi to advance standards-based B2B e-commerce for all industries.”

“This demonstration highlights a critical step in tearing down the barriers to seamless B2B communication,” said John Ogilvie, president of Killdara, an integration partner at the e2K event.  “Killdara is extremely pleased to join the other vendors in this OAGi-Ford event.”

About Open Applications Group

The Open Applications Group is a non-profit consortium focusing on best practices and process-based XML content for eBusiness and application integration.  It is the largest publisher of XML-based content for business software interoperability in the world.  Open Applications Group, Inc. members have over five years of extensive experience in building this industry consensus-based framework for business software application interoperability and have developed a repeatable process for quickly developing high-quality business content using XML.

OAGi members include: Active Software, Agile, AT&T Wireless, Bluestone, CANDLE Corp., Canopy International, CIMLINC, Compaq, CrossWorlds Software, DATEV eG, DHL, Digital Paper, Electron Economy, eXcelon Software, Extricity Software, Ford Motor Company, Future Three, Great Plains, irista (formerly HK Systems), I2, IBM, Integrated Systems & Services, J.D. Edwards, Killdara, Lockheed Martin, Lockheed Martin Systems Solutions, Lucent Technologies, Mega International, Microsoft, NEC Corporation, Netfish, OASIS, OMG, OnDisplay, Oracle Corporation, PCS, PeopleSoft, Inc., PricewaterhouseCoopers, PSDI, Inc., QAD, Inc., Requisite  Technology, Robocom Systems Intl., Saga Software, Sand Hill Systems, SAP AG, StreamServe, SupplierMarket.com, Teklogix, Tilion, Trilogy, TSI, Unilever, USData, Viewlocity, Vitria, webMethods, Wonderware, XML Solutions and XML Global.

For more information visit the web site at: www.openapplications.org.