SDRC Acquires Inovie® Software, Inc.

Acquisition sets up key element in SDRC's collaborative product management strategy

Read the Inovie Acquistion FAQ page.

CINCINNATI-April 4, 2001-SDRC (Nasdaq: SDRC) today announced that it has acquired Inovie® Software, Inc. of San Diego, California, a leading provider of Web-based, peer-to-peer collaborative project management software. SDRC is accounting for the transaction as a purchase, and the financial effect is expected to be slightly dilutive to SDRC earnings in 2001.

The acquisition of Inovie sets up a key element in SDRC's collaborative product management strategy, providing a breakthrough enterprise solution that allows companies to reduce costs and cycle times associated with globally diverse programs. SDRC will immediately begin to couple Inovie's project management software with its collaborative product management solutions. With this combination, SDRC's team-centric solutions, accessed through a single collaboration portal, are the first to integrate project management, change control, life cycle integration, and visual product configuration.

SDRC will also continue to offer Inovie's products as they are packaged and sold today to a variety of non-manufacturing industries and end-user applications

The combination of SDRC's Metaphase® product knowledge management (PKM) and Accelis™ e-Business integration suite (e-BI) with Inovie's collaborative project management offerings will facilitate collaboration on enterprise product and project data, while also offering secure, web-based collaborative project management capabilities to manufacturing enterprises and their extended supply chains for:

  • managing distributed product design and development efforts;

  • rolling out new products to market;

  • establishing, coordinating and documenting project changes worldwide;

  • managing business partners and consultants throughout a project's lifecycle.

Inovie's solutions contain the broadest scope of Java-certified functionality available in the market today for virtual business teams that must collaborate both real-time and asynchronously in the global distributed "e-workplace." These collaborative e-workplace capabilities provide:

  • product management as well as project management;

  • resource management and interactive Gantt scheduling;

  • automated schedule updating and change notifications via e-mail;

  • secure, Web-based document collaboration and management;

  • enterprise-wide reporting including executive view and reports;

  • 100% Web-native open architecture that supports the widest variety of server platforms, operating systems, Web servers/browsers, LDAP directory services.

Quoting an existing Inovie customer from Engelhard Corporation, "There was a gap between the traditional desktop project management tools and what we needed. We were using Microsoft Project and Microsoft Team Manager, but needed much more collaboration. Inovie's solutions provided a way for our team members to see one another's work and to leave their knowledge in detail with their task. We liked the features that allow team members to assign tasks to each other without a manager involved. Inovie has provided us a placeholder for our project deliverables and helped us to clearly define and stick to our target dates."

"SDRC is continuing to aggressively expand its collaborative e-business applications," said Bill Weyand, chairman and CEO, SDRC. "The acquisition of Inovie is one of a series of strategic actions in support of SDRC's goal of providing a complete suite of tools and services for collaborative product management to global manufacturers, thereby increasing our customers' business success and SDRC's business value to our customers."

"Inovie believes there is a tremendous untapped market for collaborative product development and other integrated e-business applications in major corporations throughout the world," said Robert Pryor, president and CEO of Inovie. "We expect that the richness and customer acceptance of SDRC's products, combined with the broad range of functionality within Inovie's collaborative project management applications, will create a new class of enterprise solutions."

Wit Soundview acted as investment advisor to Inovie Software in this transaction.

About Inovie - http://www.inovie.com
Inovie Software, with headquarters in San Diego, California, provides Internet project collaboration software that enables geographically distributed product and project teams to communicate and coordinate activities globally in real-time. Inovie's flagship product provides a secure, Web-based e-Business collaboration workplace ("e-Workplace") that permits real-time project collaboration among an organization's team members and their outsourced or supply chain partners. Inovie first introduced their products at the end of 1998, and they are now in their fifth release.

 

About SDRC
SDRC (Structural Dynamics Research Corporation), with headquarters in Ohio, provides software solutions and services that propel manufacturers to increased business competitiveness through the development of a web-based, collaborative environment for product development. SDRC employs more than 2,500 people worldwide, with 64 offices in 18 countries throughout North America, Europe, and Asia/Pacific.

Note to Editors: SDRC and Metaphase are registered trademarks, and Accelis is a trademark of Structural Dynamics Research Corporation. Inovie is a registered service mark of Inovie Software, Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Structural Dynamics Research Corporation. All other trademarks or registered trademarks belong to their respective holders.

 

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