$63 Million Investment Secured by Global Commerce Systems Inc.; Signals Accelerated Global Expansion and Delivery of Integrated Trade Cycle Offering.Business Editors/High Tech Writers BROOMFIELD, Colo.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 18, 2000 Global Commerce Systems Inc. (GCS GCS Glasgow Coma Scale GCS Guilford County Schools (North Carolina) GCS Ground Control Station GCS Grand Central Station GCS Ground Control System GCS Ground Combat Systems GCS Group Communication Systems ) (www.commerce.com) today announced that it has secured a $63 million Series C financing investment. The Company's new investors are Red Coat Capital Management, L.L.C., J&W Seligman & Co., Blair Asset Management L.P. and Blue Ridge Capital, L.L.C. They join Global Commerce Systems' original investment group of GE Capital Financial, GE Equity and First Analysis Corp. "This investment, and the caliber and track record of the investors, is further validation of the long-term value of our approach to enabling banks and their commercial customers to go beyond procurement-focused 'B2B' e-commerce to trusted, real-time global commerce. GCS integrated trade-cycle solutions enable manufacturing service companies and their vendors, banks and customers to dynamically integrate the fundamental elements of their commercial trade cycles -- sales, procurement, payment and settlement -- into one real-time process," said Geoffrey Shaw, chairman, CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. and co-founder, Global Commerce Systems. "Coupling these trade cycle management capabilities with trusted identification and commercial transaction management services enables financial institutions to provide high-value cash and trusted risk management services to enhance the economic efficiency of their customers' operations. Our new investors understand the strength of our business model, our intrinsic value, and our long-term competitive advantages as both an enabler and an outsourced operator of globally integrated trade cycle operations." "We made this investment because Global Commerce Systems is the only company we see addressing the needs of the world's best-known companies to dynamically integrate their trade cycle business systems with those of their financial partners, suppliers, customers and other partners in an increasingly interconnected global economy," said Kenneth L. Londoner, CEO and general partner, Red Coat Capital Management, L.L.C. "They integrate basic buy-side and sell-side transactions with payment, settlement and customer relationship management, all within secure online environments to allow a standardized, straight-through processing exchange environment. "The GCS approach is based on a fundamental commitment to enabling producers of goods and services In economics, economic output is divided into physical goods and intangible services. Consumption of goods and services is assumed to produce utility (unless the "good" is a "bad"). It is often used when referring to a Goods and Services Tax. and their respective banking partners the freedom to interconnect and conduct commerce on their own terms. This differs from the 'aggregate-and-hammer' thinking of so-called B2B (Business to Business) Refers to one business communicating with or selling to another. See B2B e-commerce, B2C and B2G. B2B - business to business service providers who seek to insert themselves as intermediaries between suppliers and buyers and disenfranchise dis·en·fran·chise tr.v. dis·en·fran·chised, dis·en·fran·chis·ing, dis·en·fran·chis·es To disfranchise. dis them and their financial partners from the relationships and value propositions that are at the core of competitive free markets," Londoner added. Global Commerce Systems will use the new funds to continue global expansion activities and development of its Commerce.com(TM) products and services offering for the world's leading industrial and services firms. "This investment will be focused on shrinking the time to deployment of our integrated trade cycle risk management solutions for banks and suppliers who want the freedom to control their own destinies by deploying secure, trusted and branded online trading platforms to support real-time global commerce," Shaw added. Global Commerce Systems customers include General Electric Co. (NYSE NYSE See: New York Stock Exchange :GE), Sprint Corp. (NYSE:FON Fon People of southern Benin and adjacent parts of Togo. They speak a dialect of Gbe, a Kwa language of the Niger-Congo language family. Numbering about 3 million, the Fon are mainly farmers. ), Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE:WFC WFC Wi-Fi Connection (Nintendo gaming service) WFC Wide-Field Camera WFC World Financial Center (New York) WFC Workforce Center WFC World Federation of Chiropractic WFC World Food Council ), UMB Financial Corp. (Nasdaq:UMBF) and Giddings & Lewis. GCS has alliances with some of the world's leading technology providers, including IBM (NYSE:IBM), Sun Microsystems Inc. (Nasdaq:SUNW SUNW Sun Microsystems, Inc (former stock symbol; now JAVA) SUNW Stanford University Network Workstation (Sun Microsystems, Inc) ), GE Capital Financial and Oracle (Nasdaq:ORCL ORCL Oracle (stock symbol) ). Commerce.com software products are 100 percent Java-based, and leverage a customer's existing ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) An integrated information system that serves all departments within an enterprise. Evolving out of the manufacturing industry, ERP implies the use of packaged software rather than proprietary software written by or for one customer. and financial systems, legacy data systems and business rules to enable real-time trade cycle integration and global commerce. GCS' Client Services organization provides comprehensive trade cycle solution planning, design and implementation services. GCS' Managed Services organization provides secure 24-7 application and database hosting and operations management, and its Learning Services organization provides certified training and education for technical, operations and management professionals. About Global Commerce Systems Inc. Global Commerce Systems (GCS) is a leader in software and services that enable companies to deploy and manage branded online trade cycle management and trusted global commerce services. GCS trusted global commerce solutions enable businesses to dynamically integrate and interconnect their existing business systems with those of their partners, banks, vendors, and customers. By providing clients with Freedom of Commerce(TM), GCS permits companies to choose the means, policies, practices and processes by which they participate in the digital economy. GCS Commerce.com(TM) software products are 100 percent Java-based, providing companies the fastest time-to-benefit and greatest return on investment. For more information, connect with www.commerce.com or call 303/583-5000. About Red Coat Capital Partners, L.P. Founded by Kenneth L. Londoner in 1997, Red Coat Capital Partners, L.P. invests in the U.S. equity marketplace, with decisions driven by a fundamental analytical approach toward identifying undervalued Undervalued A stock or other security that is trading below its true value. Notes: The difficulty is knowing what the "true" value actually is. Analysts will usually recommend an undervalued stock with a strong buy rating. and overvalued Overvalued A stock whose current price is not justified by the earnings outlook or price/earnings (P/E) ratio and thus, expected to drop in price. Overvaluation may result from an emotional buying spurt, which inflates the market price of the stock or from a deterioration in a securities. Rigorous and in-depth industry knowledge combined with sharp company analysis guides investment policy. For more information call 212/557-6455. The specific Red Coat Capital funds contributing to this investment are Red Coat Capital Partners, L.P., Red Coat Capital Partners II, L.P., Red Coat Capital Investors I, L.L.C., and Red Coat Capital LTD LTD 1 Laron-type dwarfism 2 Leukotriene D 3 Long-term depression, see there 4. Long-term disability . About J&W Seligman & Co. J. & W. Seligman & Co. Incorporated was founded in 1864. Based in New York City New York City: see New York, city. New York City City (pop., 2000: 8,008,278), southeastern New York, at the mouth of the Hudson River. The largest city in the U.S. , Seligman is an investment manager and advisor with more than $35 billion in assets under management Assets Under Management (AUM) is a term used by financial services companies in the mutual fund and money management or investment management business to gauge how much money they are managing. . As well as providing management and advisory services to institutional clients, the firm provides a broad array of investments to individuals including the Seligman Group of Funds group of funds See family of funds. with more than 50 portfolios and a range of retirement services. Additionally, it manages Tri-Continental Corporation, the nation's largest publicly traded, diversified closed-end investment company closed-end investment company: see mutual fund. , and two closed-end municipal bond funds which are traded on the New York Stock Exchange New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) World's largest marketplace for securities. The exchange began as an informal meeting of 24 men in 1792 on what is now Wall Street in New York City. . Seligman also manages a range of offshore investments available exclusively for non-US investors. The specific Seligman funds contributing to this investment are Seligman New Technologies Fund, Inc., Seligman Investment Opportunities (Master) Fund - NTV Portfolio, Seligman Investment Opportunities (Master) Fund - NTV II Portfolio, and Seligman Communications and Information Fund, Inc. About Blair Asset Management L.P. Founded in January 1998 by Chris Blair, Blair Asset Management provides true crossover support to its private investments in the form of strategic partnerships with top technology firms. Blair Asset Management invests in premier growth companies in technology and communications areas. The specific Blair Asset Management funds contributing to this investment are C. Blair Partners, L.P., C. Blair Partners II, L.P., and C. Blair Fund, LTD. About Blue Ridge Capital L.P. Blue Ridge Capital is an investment partnership started by John Griffin in June 1996. The firm seeks high absolute returns by owning shares in businesses with outstanding investment characteristics and selling short the stock of companies with fundamental problems. Investment decisions are based on detailed, company-specific research with a long-term horizon. The specific Blue Ridge funds contributing to this investment are Blue Ridge Limited Partnership and Blue Ridge Private Equity Fund, L.L.C. Global Commerce Systems, the Global Commerce Systems logo, Commerce.com and the Commerce.com suite of products and services are trademarks of Global Commerce Systems, Inc. Other company, product or service names maybe the trademarks or servicemarks of others. |
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