SAP Portals and PwC Consulting Forge Global Alliance To Deliver Enterprise Portal Solutions

Business Wire, March 6, 2002

Business Editors & High-Tech Writers

SAN JOSE, Calif. & NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 6, 2002

Cross-Industry Alliance Aims to Foster Communication, Collaboration

Within Organizations Through B2E Initiative

SAP Portals, Inc., a leading provider of open-enterprise portal and business intelligence solutions and a wholly owned subsidiary of SAP AG (NYSE:SAP), and PwC Consulting(TM), a business of PricewaterhouseCoopers, today announced a global alliance to deliver enterprise portal and business intelligence solutions to clients around the world.

SAP Portals will deliver its Enterprise Portal and Business Intelligence (BI) technology for PwC Consulting's recently unveiled B2E (business-to-extended enterprise) initiative, which enables global enterprises to optimize their use of Web-based portal technologies.

Through the alliance, SAP Portals and PwC Consulting are working closely together in targeting multinational clients that may implement PwC Consulting's B2E solution using SAP Portals(TM) Enterprise Portal(TM). Clients will be able to tap into the wide array of industry-leading business solutions from SAP Portals, with the full range of consulting and implementation services from PwC Consulting. PwC Consulting already has one of the largest resource pools of talent (outside of SAP) experienced in SAP(R) software and solutions, including an iAnalytics practice with SAP Business Warehouse and Business Intelligence experience and focus, and also a non-SAP enterprise resource planning (ERP) consulting practice that contributes background for the implementation of SAP Portals enterprise portal and business intelligence solutions.

TransAlta Corp., Canada's largest nonregulated electric generation and marketing company, is already tapping into the alliance between SAP Portals and PwC Consulting.

"TransAlta is an organization in which people continue to enhance productivity through new levels of connectivity, communication and collaboration," said Paul Kurchina, program manager of TransAlta. "We are working closely with PwC Consulting and SAP Portals to deploy our enterprise portal solution to achieve measurable business results."

The alliance with SAP Portals will extend the skill set of PwC Consulting's practitioners by fostering training and joint sales and marketing activity between the two organizations, in the areas of enterprise portals and business intelligence. Complementary and supporting technology products and services -- in the areas of knowledge management and premium content -- will round out the SAP Portals-PwC Consulting offering.

"Our goal is to provide you with the desktop environment that supports your job, the one place you come to get everything you need to know," said Shai Agassi, CEO of SAP Portals. "We are pleased to work with PwC Consulting to help our customers realize the benefits of their enterprise portal investments. PwC Consulting's demonstrated ability to deliver fully integrated, industry-specific consulting and integration services, combined with SAP Portals' extensive experience in tightly integrating data from many different sources inside and outside the enterprise, all on one open and collaborative platform, will enable customers to witness meaningful business results."

"SAP Portals shares with us a vision to move work to the Web, so that colleagues, customers and partners can do their jobs efficiently. Given our track record with SAP, our collaboration with SAP Portals in the B2E space is a natural extension of our strategic SAP relationship," said David Duray, partner and global leader of the SAP practice for PwC Consulting.

In light of global economic conditions, many multinational organizations have a renewed interest in and heightened need for technologies such as enterprise portals that allow companies to optimize work force productivity. The portal infrastructure of today has evolved from that of yesterday, with a capability that enables individuals -- regardless of their role or location -- to tap into critical information, processes and systems.

The B2E solution set combines PwC Consulting's consulting, systems integration and IT governance services with products and services -- now including those from SAP Portals -- that address security, identity management, hosting and a range of business applications necessary to establish a portal infrastructure. Central to the offering is the anytime, anywhere access to Internet and intranet applications in a secure, outsourced environment. PwC Consulting will showcase B2E, including SAP Portals solutions, at its solution demonstration centers in Australia, Canada, Denmark, the United Kingdom and the United States.

About PwC Consulting

PwC Consulting (http://www.pwcconsulting.com) is a global provider of services that transform the businesses of established and emerging enterprises. With a network of global alliances, industry-specific knowledge, and capabilities in strategy consulting, process improvement and technology integration, PwC Consulting practitioners help realize a strategic vision and enhance enterprise value for our clients. PwC Consulting refers to the management consulting services businesses of the member firms of the worldwide PricewaterhouseCoopers organization.