ALLTEL's ACBS Selected by IFC for Its Commercial Lending Portfolio; Deployment Will Hold Down Costs for International Development Lender

Business Wire, July 10, 2002

Business Editors & Technology Writers

The International Financial Corp. (IFC), the private-sector lending arm of the World Bank Group, selected ALLTEL (NYSE:AT) through a competitive bid system to process and manage IFC's portfolio of loans to companies in emerging markets. ALLTEL Information Services will deploy its ACBS commercial lending system as an application service provider, an arrangement that will hold down front-end costs and speed the system into production for the IFC.

"The system will enable IFC to set up its own policies and procedures to originate and service its complex portfolio," said Richard Levy, president of ALLTEL's ACBS division. "In addition, IFC will be able to manage greater loan volumes more quickly and at less cost and risk."

The IFC installation will include the Deal & Loan Origination, Deal & Loan Servicing and DataMart components of the ACBS product line. IFC will use its new lending software to service and manage its entire international loan portfolio, which spans more than 40 countries.

IFC finances private sector investments in the developing world, requiring an innovative deal structure tailored to the special requirements of the country and borrower.

"Emerging market financings are often complex, long-term arrangements that demand flexible documentation and servicing capabilities as well as very strong portfolio management resources," said Avi Hofman, head of financial operations for IFC. "By combining the ACBS system with an ASP solution, IFC will be employing a flexible loan system that offers us the processing capabilities and reliability levels we require while allowing us to keep internal infrastructure costs and operating budgets to a minimum."

ALLTEL's ACBS is an integrated family of commercial lending products that automates the entire range of commercial lending activity, from deal origination through settlement and accounting to risk management and loan trading. The products operate in real time in any currency. ACBS products run on AS/400 and Windows platforms and are licensed by 36 leading financial institutions, including ABN AMRO, Bank of America, Barclays, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Dresdner Bank, JPMorgan Chase, PNC and Scotiabank.

Forty-seven of the top 50 U.S. banks rely on ALLTEL's products and services. ALLTEL clients process in excess of 60 percent of the syndicated loans. ALLTEL also provides loan servicing automation for more than 20 million mortgage loans, with balances exceeding $2 trillion. Additionally, more than 34 percent of the total dollar volume of outstanding U.S. consumer loans, including mortgages, is processed on ALLTEL Information Services' software applications.

ALLTEL, with more than 10 million communications customers and $7.5 billion in annual revenues, is a leader in the communications and information services industries. ALLTEL has communications customers in 24 states and provides information services to telecommunications, financial and mortgage clients in more than 50 countries.