SPE.L Regulatory News (SPE)

1 Oct 2007 07:02

Sopheon PLC01 October 2007 Embargoed Release: 07:00hrs Monday 1 October 2007 Sopheon Plc ("Sopheon", the "Group" or the "Company") Scott Bader Sharpens Innovation Focus with Sopheon's Accolade(R) System Sopheon, the international software and services company, announced today thatScott Bader, a U.K.-based producer of composite and specialty polymer resins,has selected Sopheon's Accolade product life cycle management (PLM) solution toenhance the company's product innovation and portfolio management processes.Scott Bader will deploy the Sopheon system among users in research anddevelopment, marketing and executive roles at company locations in the U.K.,France, North America, Croatia, South Africa and Dubai. Founded in 1920, Scott Bader has a rich history as a product innovator. Thecompany created the first polyester resin that would cure at room temperature,the first air-drying polyesters, and the first polyester resins for marineapplications. The latter were used to make the hull for the world's first largeglass-reinforced plastic boat. Scott Bader is a past winner of the QueensAward, the highest honor a U.K. company can receive for technologicalinnovation. Against this backdrop of achievement, Scott Bader recently launched anorganization-wide strategic initiative aimed at renewing the company'scommitment to innovation. A principal goal of the effort is to increase marketshare by accelerating product development and bringing more successful productsto market. Underlying strategies include shifting the focus of research anddevelopment away from custom resin solutions toward new-to-the-world productswith broad market appeal. Sopheon's Accolade system will play a central part inthe initiative by enabling Scott Bader to automate its product developmentprocess and make more informed decisions about which product ideas to develop. In addition to providing process automating capabilities, the Accolade modulesbeing deployed by Scott Bader will furnish advanced support for productportfolio, resource and idea management. Expected advantages include moreeffective prioritization of product development projects, improved visibility ofproject details, stronger collaboration within project teams and acrossfunctional silos, and more consistent focus of resources on commerciallypromising product opportunities. The idea management module will facilitate thesubmission and capture of product ideas and supply scorecards that will helpusers systematically and objectively evaluate them. Scott Bader is alsoimplementing an Accolade Accelerator application that will reduce the amount oftime required to put the company's new innovation process in place. "It's important to our business success that we continue to further the maturityof our innovation process," said Global Research and Development Director RoyPhillipps of Scott Bader. "One area where we want to grow in sophistication isprocess measurement. Accolade will help us capture the metrics needed to trackand evaluate the efficiency and predictability of our process and the businessvalue of the projects that pass through it. The best-practice content providedby the Sopheon system is also important to us because it will enhance ourreporting capabilities and support the kind of 'what-if' analysisrequired to make the right go/kill business decisions on projects coming intoour developmental pipeline. Chemistry is our business. But innovation is ourpath to creating value for our customers. We view Accolade as a criticalcomponent of our value-creation strategy." "Today's chemical industry is $2.2 trillion in size and growing," said BryanSeyfarth, solutions marketing director for Sopheon. "For most chemicalproducers, however, product commoditization is a significant, continuingchallenge. Scott Bader has long understood that the answer is productinnovation. They have made it a focal point of their business goals andphilosophy. The business decision-support and process efficiencies thatAccolade can provide are directly aligned with their requirements. Scott Baderjoins more than 50 top chemical and chemical-related companies around the worldthat are using Accolade today to address their needs for effective innovationprocess governance." Sopheon Accolade(R) is a registered trademark of Sopheon plc. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are the sole property of theirrespective owners. About Scott Bader Scott Bader is a global company which manufactures a wide range of UPR, DCPD andVE resins, compounded resins, gelcoats, bonding pastes and structural adhesivesfor the composite industry. Scott Bader is also a major European distributor ofreinforcements and ancillary products. Scott Bader Composites supplies highquality, technically superior polyester resins and gelcoats under the Crystic(R)brand name from manufacturing locations around the world. For more information,please visit www.scottbader.com. About Sopheon Sopheon (LSE:SPE) is an international provider of software and services thathelp organizations improve the business impact of product innovation. Sopheon'ssolutions automate and govern the innovation process, enabling companies toincrease revenue and profits from new products. Sopheon is listed on the AIMMarket of the London Stock Exchange and on the Euronext in the Netherlands. Formore information, please visit www.sopheon.com. For further information contact: Barry Mence, Chairman Sopheon plc Tel : + 44 (0) 1483 685 735Arif Karimjee, CFO Andrew Tan Hansard Tel : + 44 (0) 207 245 1100 + 44 (0) 7957 203 685Floor van Maaren Citigate First Financial Tel : + 31 (0) 205 754 010 This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange