Business Objects Positioned in the Leader Quadrant in Business Intelligence Platform Magic Quadrant

Business Wire, Jan 10, 2006

SAN JOSE, Calif. & PARIS -- Business Objects (Nasdaq:BOBJ)(Euronext Paris ISIN code: FR0004026250 - BOB), the world's leading provider of business intelligence (BI) solutions, today announced that it has been positioned in the Leaders quadrant in the most recent Gartner Business Intelligence Platform Magic Quadrant, published this week.(1) According to Gartner, "leaders" are vendors who are performing well today, have a clear vision of market direction, and are actively building competencies to sustain their leadership position in the market.

Business Objects continues to strengthen its position with the recent launch of BusinessObjects(TM) XI Release 2. Significant enhancements and new capabilities in BusinessObjects XI Release 2 deliver improved simplicity for end users, trusted information across the enterprise, and the ability to standardize on a single BI platform. In addition, Business Objects also unveiled BusinessObjects Intelligent Question(TM), a groundbreaking innovation that allows anyone to intuitively ask business questions and receive the correct answers, without the need to build a query or know the underlying systems or data.

Customers around the world continually praise Business Objects for its innovative technology and clear vision for the future of business intelligence. AstraZeneca is one example of a customer that is excited about BusinessObjects XI Release 2 and Intelligent Question.

"As a customer who has standardized on Business Objects globally, we are delighted that BusinessObjects XI Release 2 allows us to build on our existing investment by continuing to provide pioneering technology that meets our evolving business needs," said Ed Johnson, solutions architect at AstraZeneca. "This new version of the Business Objects platform will transform our ability to deliver information to more users, providing greater clarity, business context, and guided decision making. Specifically, BusinessObjects Intelligent Question is a groundbreaking innovation that will allow any employee, whatever their role or level of expertise, to easily ask questions and quickly get the answers they need to help them do their job more effectively. In addition, we are impressed that all of these capabilities are available on one integrated platform that can provide us with one point of access for all our BI content. The powerful capabilities in BusinessObjects XI Release 2 will give us a competitive edge, whether helping us to be first-to-market with new products, or to better manage overall business performance."

"We have a keen understanding that to be successful in this industry you must have clear goals and be able to deliver impactful, cutting-edge solutions to customers," said John Schwarz, CEO of Business Objects. "Innovation for innovation's sake is not enough. We understand where the market is headed and continue to deliver the technology innovations that customers require to expand the use of business intelligence and enable them to improve their business performance. This has been a key driver in our success, and has enabled us to become the first business intelligence company to pass the $1 billion mark in trailing 12-month revenues."

About Business Objects

Business Objects is the world's leading business intelligence (BI) software company. With more than 30,000 customers worldwide, including over 80 percent of the Fortune 500, Business Objects helps organizations gain better insight into their business, improve decision making, and optimize enterprise performance. The company's business intelligence platform, BusinessObjects(TM) XI, offers the BI industry's most advanced and complete platform for performance management, planning, reporting, query and analysis, and data integration. BusinessObjects XI includes Crystal Reports(R), the industry standard for enterprise reporting. Business Objects has built the industry's strongest and most diverse partner community, and also offers consulting and education services to help customers effectively deploy their business intelligence projects.

Business Objects has dual headquarters in San Jose, Calif., and Paris, France. The company's stock is traded on both the Nasdaq (BOBJ) and Euronext Paris (ISIN: FR0004026250 - BOB) stock exchanges. More information about Business Objects can be found at www.businessobjects.com.

About the Gartner Magic Quadrant

The Magic Quadrant is copyrighted January 9, 2006 by Gartner, Inc. and is reused with permission. The Magic Quadrant is a graphical representation of a marketplace at and for a specific time period. It depicts Gartner's analysis of how certain vendors measure against criteria for that marketplace, as defined by Gartner. Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in the Magic Quadrant, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors placed in the "Leaders" quadrant. The Magic Quadrant is intended solely as a research tool, and is not meant to be a specific guide to action. Gartner disclaims all warranties, express or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.