CombineNet

CombineNet Reports Record Growth in New Customer Acquisition as Companies Seek New Ways to Reduce Costs in Challenging Economy

Growth Product strategy gaining momentum as customers increase adoption of self-service optimized sourcing solutions

PITTSBURGH, April 29 /PRNewswire/ -- CombineNet, the leading provider of advanced sourcing and optimization technologies, announced that the challenging economic conditions facing all companies today is driving broad interest and increased adoption of its OnCall and OnPlan Sourcing Solutions as customers look to reduce costs across strategic spend categories. The company reported that in addition to expanding business with existing customers, it has signed six new accounts in the first quarter of 2009 in a variety of industries and spend categories. Coupled with a strong finish in 2008, with annual sales growth of 21% in the US and Europe over 2007, CombineNet's momentum in the sourcing technology market is being fueled by companies' efforts to find new ways to reduce supply chain costs in a recessionary environment.

'Chief Financial Officers are pushing heads of supply chain and procurement to reduce costs quickly wherever they can to help their organizations survive and thrive in these difficult times,' said Tony Bonidy, CombineNet President and CEO. 'Forward-looking companies recognize that in strategic spend categories, where supplier financial health is an increasingly important issue, companies must work with their suppliers to find new efficiencies and more innovative solutions, and CombineNet helps them do this at a global scale.'

The company's first quarter results show broad new adoption across various industries and spend categories:

Industry adoption spanned Retail, CPG, Energy, Government and Telecommunications.Spend categories included Transportation, Building Materials, Capital Equipment, and Direct Materials.Twelve of eighteen recent customers have signed long-term deals to use CombineNet's OnCall and OnPlan Sourcing Solutions on a multi-year, continuous basis.

'Our strong sales performance and the increase in long-term agreements is an endorsement of our continued investment in new technologies and products that drive continuous value in these challenging times,' continued Bonidy. 'Delivering easy-to-use sourcing optimization solutions with best-practices embedded around specific categories is enabling more organizations to leverage the power of our industry-leading sourcing optimization technologies across a greater portion of their strategic spend.'

The CombineNet Advanced Sourcing Application Platform (ASAP) is a Web-based, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) technology solution that provides industry-leading optimization technology to solve complex strategic sourcing and supply allocation problems. CombineNet ASAP is changing the way organizations source a wide variety of strategic spend categories by providing the ability to quickly analyze innovative, expressive supplier proposals in the context of their business constraints, goals and preferences. Companies are using ASAP's category-specific pre-configured and configurable OnCall and OnPlan Sourcing Solutions to explore new cost reduction opportunities and supplier innovations, to identify the best combination of cost and value -- the optimal solution.

About CombineNet
CombineNet, the advanced sourcing technology company, helps companies achieve the absolute best value and lowest total cost of ownership for goods and services. CombineNet's Advanced Sourcing Application Platform enables companies to engage in Expressive Commerce(TM), the strategic sourcing initiative that allows buyers and sellers to communicate supply and demand more expressively, collaboratively and strategically. The result is a win-win for both buyer and supplier, where greater innovation and efficiency are driven into the supply chain. CombineNet's ASAP consistently produces 10, 15, even 20 percent greater actual cost savings than other e-sourcing solutions, and has delivered billions of dollars in savings for the largest businesses in the world including General Mills, PepsiCo, Procter & Gamble, Siemens and others. For more information, visit www.combinenet.com.