STAR Adds DealerTrack to its Membership

MCLEAN, Va., April 9 -- DealerTrack, Inc., a technology services company enabling finance transactions between automobile dealers and lenders through its DealerTrack(TM) platform, has joined STAR, the Information Technology (IT) standards body for the North American retail automotive industry.

STAR (Standards for Technology in Automotive Retail) is a non-profit, auto industry-wide initiative to create voluntary IT standards for the data elements and transmission format used by manufacturers, dealers, and retail system providers to communicate with each other. STAR's initiatives will result in a more efficient data exchange between dealers and manufacturers, with lower costs, more accurate and timely data, and increased levels of customer satisfaction.

DealerTrack plans to take an active role in the STAR initiative and utilize the organization's IT standards to further automate and accelerate financing processes between more than 19,000 dealers and 24 lenders.

"As North America's largest independent channel for end-to-end loan and lease transactions, we see the critical importance of IT standards that allow interoperability among our customers' various IT solutions," stated Charlie Giglia, senior vice president and chief information officer of DealerTrack. "That interoperability will allow dealers and lenders to seamlessly integrate key software platforms faster and with less expense."

"We're excited that DealerTrack has joined STAR and has plans to use STAR standards. Their decision to use these standards should help to further streamline the auto financing process for their dealers and lenders," says Tom Campisi, communication chair for STAR.

About STAR (www.starstandard.org)

The Standards for Technology in Automotive Retail (STAR) organization is the Information Technology (IT) standards organization for the retail automotive industry. The goal of the STAR organization is to use IT standards as a catalyst in fulfilling the business information needs of dealers and manufacturers while reducing the time and effort previously required to support this activity.

Headquartered in McLean, Virginia, STAR is a not-for-profit volunteer organization and its members include Dealers, Manufacturers and Retail System Providers (RSPs). As members, they are interested in developing, promoting, and administering voluntary IT standards in the retail automotive industry and improving the effectiveness, timeliness and competitiveness of the IT solutions needed within the retail automotive industry.

  STAR membership roster:

  Dealer Groups: NADA

Retail System Providers: ADP, AFSA, Arkona, Auto/Mate Inc., Cobalt Group, DealerTrack, EDS Automotive Retail Group, PBS Financial Systems Inc., Procede Software, Reynolds & Reynolds, RouteOne, Sun Microsystems, Tibco, UCS

Manufacturers: American Honda Motor Co., Inc., American Isuzu Motors, Inc., American Suzuki Motor Corp., BMW of North America, Inc., DaimlerChrysler, Ford Motor Company, General Motors Corp., Hyundai Motor Company, Jaguar Cars, Kia Motors America, Mazda North American Operations, Mitsubishi Motor Sales of America, Inc., Nissan North America, Inc., Porsche Cars North America, Inc., Renault, Saab Cars USA, Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Volkswagen of America, Volvo Cars of North America

About DealerTrack (www.dealertrack.com)

With over 19,000 dealers and 24 lenders currently connected, DealerTrack is North America's premier independent Web-based platform that automates and accelerates the entire dealer-to-lender relationship, from financing to daily information sharing. The DealerTrack platform enables application processing, credit bureau access, electronic contracting and lease comparisons -- all in one easy-to-use, integrated solution. More information on DealerTrack is available at www.dealertrack.com or by calling 877-357-8725.