Marlborough Stirling's Independent Financial Advisor Portal Integrates Actuate Technology; Industry Standard for UK Financial Intermediaries Deploys Actuate

Business Wire, Nov 3, 2003

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 3, 2003

Actuate Corporation (Nasdaq:ACTU), the world leader in scalable Business Intelligence Applications, today announced that its technology will be deployed via Exweb, the leading intermediary trading platform for the UK financial services industry.

Exweb is owned by Marlborough Stirling, a leading provider of solutions to the financial services industry. It provides financial intermediaries with online information and transaction services, enabling them to research, quote and buy financial products electronically on behalf of their clients. It has in excess of 18,500 registered users and processed 99 million comparative product quotations in 2002.

Actuate's software for online information management and reporting will be integrated into Exweb and will enable Independent Financial Advisors (IFAs) to view client data and produce reports for internal and external use. This will save IFAs significant time and resources that are currently spent on routine administrative tasks.

Mike Lloyd, Head of Technology at Marlborough Stirling, said: "Exweb is already the industry standard for financial intermediaries. Now, by deploying Actuate as the information application platform, we are further enhancing our offering which will enable IFAs to increase their efficiency and profitability, cut cost, improve client servicing and reduce transaction time."

Richard Sheppard, VP EMEA of Actuate, said: "Exweb leads the way in the development of e-commerce services in the IFA market. It has revolutionized the way financial intermediaries source product quotations and interact with product providers and we are delighted that our technology has been selected to further expand this market leading solution."

About Marlborough Stirling

Marlborough Stirling (www.marlborough-stirling.com) provides solutions to the mortgage, life, pension and investment market sectors. Its software and services enable financial service providers and intermediaries to meet consumers' demand for financial products that are flexible, capable of being distributed through a variety of channels and processed efficiently.

Exweb is the UK's leading intermediary trading platform in the financial services market, used by over 18,500 registered users within IFA and other authorized firms. It provides online information and transaction services, with 99 million client illustrations processed over the service in 2002.

The group employs approximately 1,700 people and has offices in Cheltenham, Basingstoke, Brighton, Bristol, Cobham, Dudley, Halesowen, Hitchin, Dublin, Douglas in the Isle of Man, Cape Town, Madrid, Milan, Toronto and Vancouver.

Clients of the group include Alliance & Leicester, Bank of Scotland, CIBC, Co-operative Insurance Society, Coventry Building Society, Egg, Legal & General, Nationwide Building Society, NBS Bank, Royal London, Sanlam and Sun Life Financial of Canada (UK).

About Actuate Corporation

Actuate Corporation is the world leader in scalable Business Intelligence applications. Actuate's Information Application Platform is the foundation on which Global 9000 organizations (companies with annual revenues greater than $1 billion) and packaged application software vendors create reporting and analytics applications that scale to empower 100 percent of their user community inside and outside the firewall. These Information Applications include Business Performance Management (BPM) dashboards, Information Portals as well as business analytic, enterprise reporting and spreadsheet reporting applications. Information Applications built with Actuate enable companies to increase their business agility, improve customer and partner relationships, adhere to corporate governance policies, and increase revenues while leveraging existing technology assets. When tested against other business intelligence products, Actuate's Information Application Platform has been proven to offer industry-leading scalability, the best performance, lowest Total Cost of Ownership. Actuate has over 2,200 direct customers and 300 OEM partners in a range of industries including financial services, pharmaceuticals, insurance, and distribution services, as well as the government sector.

Founded in 1993, Actuate has headquarters in South San Francisco, Calif., and has offices worldwide. For more information on Actuate, visit the company's Web site at http://www.actuate.com.

Actuate is a registered trademark of Actuate Corporation. e.Reporting and e.Spreadsheet are trademarks of Actuate Corporation. Other company names and trademarks are trademarks of their respective companies.