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Cascade Engineering Gets Quick Results With QAD's ECommerce Solution

12 November 1999

Cascade Engineering Gets Quick Results With QAD's ECommerce Solution; Nine Sites Go Live in 12 Months

    CARPINTERIA, Calif.--Nov. 11, 1999--QAD , developer of e-business-enabled enterprise and supply chain software, announced today that Cascade Engineering has successfully completed a rapid nine-site implementation of QAD applications with an e-commerce message conversion system within 12 months.
    Cascade Engineering, an automotive and consumer plastic products supplier headquartered in Grand Rapids, Mich., has become the first company to put QAD's ECommerce solution into use, which features a flexible, table-driven EDI system. This complete enterprise solution enables Cascade to integrate EDI with ECommerce, allowing it to do business electronically with trading partners around the world.
    Keys to the successful and rapid implementation of Cascade's nine sites were the consulting and implementation services provided by Deloitte & Touche LLP, and automated data collection and barcoding solutions provided by Eagle Consulting & Development. Both companies are QAD product alliance partners. The success of the project was also supported by a strong and committed internal team structure at Cascade Engineering.
    Chosen by Cascade over other software vendors, QAD applications are known for their automotive functionality and ability to be quickly and cost effectively implemented with ECommerce capability. "Our company prides itself on its leading edge technology and we wanted our enterprise solution to reflect that commitment. QAD offered the best choice to meet our production needs," said Lowell Johannsen, ERP project manager of Cascade Engineering. "Other packages would have taken two to three years to implement, whereas QAD offered much quicker results." Johannsen said that Cascade also based its decisions on QAD's ability to fully integrate applications for all nine sites, including locations that have their own individual services and databases.
    "QAD's ECommerce makes integration simpler, faster and more effective with a tighter connection to our enterprise applications," Johannsen added. "It not only gives us better access to our partners, but the flexibility to adjust quickly and inexpensively to changes in our business relationships with them. It used to take days or even weeks to accommodate new customers or changes in our customer requirements. Now we can accomplish this with technical ease and in less time."
    One of the unique benefits of QAD's ECommerce is that once an integration is done within a company it can be shared by all of its sites around the world regardless of EDI translators. QAD's ECommerce edits and transforms electronic data traveling in either direction based upon trading partner tables. Within five months of selecting QAD, the first Cascade site --a joint venture facility called StarCade-- went live on Dec. 6, 1998, implementing manufacturing, distribution and financial applications. StarCade manufactures automotive trim products and office automation products. The Noble Polymers site went live on March 1, 1999, followed on March 29 by Systex Products, another joint venture facility. The remaining five Cascade plants and corporate services sites went live simultaneously on July 11.

    About Cascade Engineering

    Grand Rapids-based Cascade Engineering is a technology leader and a leading manufacturer and designer of injection-molding products and services for a wide array of industries. Cascade Engineering's family of companies has facilities totaling 400,000 square feet and $185 million in annual sales. The company has an unswerving determination to achieve worthy goals and is committed to creating technological innovations that help its customers make history.

    About Deloitte & Touche LLP

    Deloitte & Touche LLP, one of the nation's leading professional services firms, provides accounting and auditing, tax, and management consulting services through 23,000 people in offices in more than 100 U.S. cities. Deloitte & Touche LLP is part of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, a global leader in professional services with more than 72,000 people in over 125 countries. For additional information on Deloitte & Touche, visit its Web site at http://www.us.deloitte.com. or contact Rick O'Connor, Managing Director of Deloitte & Touche Michigan Practice at 313/396-3696.

    About QAD

    Founded in 1979, QAD is a leading provider of e-business-enabled enterprise and supply chain management software and services to multinational companies of all sizes, with special focus on the mid-market. Available in 26 languages and able to support multiple currencies, QAD software helps speed business processes for more than 300,000 licensed users at more than 4,000 licensed sites in more than 80 countries.
    QAD software is specifically designed for global manufacturers in the following targeted industries: automotive, consumer products, electronics, food and beverage, industrial, and medical products. Another important advantage is QAD's quick results wherever sites are located. QAD revenues for the fiscal year ended Jan. 31, 1999, totaled $193 million. For more information about QAD, telephone +1 805 684 6614, or visit the QAD Web site at http://www.qad.com. To receive any of QAD's press releases via facsimile, contact 1 800 356 0747, or outside the U.S. contact +1 213 253 5647.

    QAD is a trademark and MFG/PRO(R) is a registered trademark of QAD Inc. All other products or company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.

    Note to Investors: This news release contains certain forward-looking statements made under the "safe harbor" provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of their dates. A number of risks and uncertainties could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. They include, but are not limited to, risks involving demand for the company's software products and products that operate with the company's products, the publication of opinions by industry analysts about the company, technological advances of new or existing competitors, delays in localizing the company's products, delays in sales due to lengthy sales cycles, changes in operating expenses, pricing, timing of new product releases, the method of product distribution or product mix, and general economic factors that might affect the company or the enterprise resource planning ("ERP") software industry. In addition, revenue and earnings in the ERP software industry are subject to fluctuations. For a more detailed description of the risk factors associated with the company and the industry, please refer to the company's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended Jan. 31, 1999, and other reports and documents filed with the SEC which are publicly available, copies of which can also be obtained by contacting the company's investor relations department at 805/566-5139. The company undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements.