Ballantine Launches Smart Tools Contact Manager Software Featuring Data Sharing with Intuit's QuickBooks 2002 Products

Business Wire, August 26, 2002

Business/Technology Editors

CARLISLE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug. 26, 2002

Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager gives small businesses an all-in-one

tool to easily create, organize and retrieve contact and project

information

Ballantine & Company, Inc., recognized specialists in project management desktop software and member of the Intuit Developer Network, today announced the release of Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager software, designed specifically to provide project managers at small businesses who also use QuickBooks Pro 2002 or QuickBooks Premier 2002 products with an affordable, all-in-one tool for professional communications and better project management.

Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager integrates the communications tools used every day by project managers--fax, email, memos, letters, and mailing labels--into one easy-to-use program. Users can cross-link any kind of file to related contacts and projects, keeping projects organized and eliminating duplicate files.

Project managers can use Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager to send and receive email and faxes, create documents, merge letters and labels, manage contact and project information, and create project to-do lists with one fully integrated program. The software saves everything automatically by contact and project, so users can retrieve it again with a single mouse click.

Multi-user Option

A multi-user Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager option allows workgroups to share information in real time using a client/server database environment, making accurate contact and project information and related files (such as documents and email) available to everyone in a workgroup. Emails, faxes, documents and to-do items can be designated as public or private to control information access.

Link to QuickBooks

Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager offers integration features that enable easy data exchange with Intuit's QuickBooks Pro 2002 and QuickBooks Premier 2002 software.

"Intuit and Ballantine both recognize that small business owners juggle many daily tasks and that they are constantly looking for ways to streamline their operations," said Esther Kruijver, director of the Intuit Developer Network. "Enabling the exchange of data between Smart Tools(c) Contact Manager and the QuickBooks 2002 products will help small businesses save time and manage their resources more efficiently, allowing them to spend more time actually running their business."

"Small businesses that use QuickBooks Pro 2002 or QuickBooks Premier 2002 products will find Smart Tools(c) Contact Manager to be the ideal solution for streamlining their project communications," said Ballantine & Company CEO, Ann F. C. Ballantine. "By offering a special edition of our contact management software for QuickBooks 2002 products, we feel we are meeting the needs of our small business customers, who want a business solution that eliminates the need to enter contact data more than once".

The link between Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager and QuickBooks Pro 2002 and QuickBooks Premier 2002 products enables users to share data, such as vendor and customer lists, between programs rather than maintaining data in more than one place. Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager users can update lists from QuickBooks, or update data to QuickBooks, sorting, viewing and selecting specific records before they are updated. Smart Tools(c) Contact Manager alerts a user if a record already exists in either Contact Manager or QuickBooks, allowing the user to compare the data before modifying the record in either program.

"We became members of the Intuit Developer Network because we knew that our small business customers wanted to see a link between our software products and the popular QuickBooks 2002 products," Ballantine said. "Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager is the first of several special edition products we plan to release featuring data integration with QuickBooks software."

Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager Pricing & Support

Like all Ballantine software products, Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager's easy-to-use notebook format, context-sensitive help, sample file and customer support get most users up and running in less than 30 minutes. Unlimited, toll-free technical support is available online or by phone. Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager also comes with a 30-day money back satisfaction guarantee.

Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager Pricing:

-- Single user - $159.00

-- Multi-user 5 Pack - $736.00

-- Multi-user 10 Pack - $1372.00

Volume and educational discounts are available.

About Ballantine

Ballantine and Company, Inc. develops and markets project-oriented desktop software used by engineers, architects, contractors, accountants, consultants and business managers.

Ballantine's Tools-for-Business.com(R) web site offers visitors professional products and business information designed to help project-oriented professionals work faster and better.

To order, call 800-536-6677 or visit www.Tools-for-Business.com.

QuickBooks is a registered trademark of Intuit Inc.

Smart Tools(R) Contact Manager and Tools-for-Business.com are registered trademarks and/or trademarks of Ballantine and Company, Inc. Other marks are the property of their respective owners.