AUTODATA DELIVERS THE FUTURE-TODAY-WITH DEBUT OF SECOND GENERATION CROSS-BRAND INTERNET 'BACKBONE' FOR AUTO INDUSTRY.

Autodata Solutions, Inc., a leading developer and supplier of automotive data, content and technology solutions for the North American automotive industry, has announced the debut of its second-generation Extensible Markup Language (XML)-based vehicle data warehouse. The company's newest technology platform resolves a critical e-business roadblock by giving auto manufacturers, fleet management companies, dealers, dealer software providers and Internet portals the power to manage complex, multi-brand vehicle data and applications that to-date have only been available in disparate formats. In fact, the majority of major fleet management companies have already deployed this XML platform as part of their e-Commerce build-to-order (BTO) initiatives. Leading analysts like Forrester Research identified such technology as a crucial prerequisite to the industry's future growth, and estimated its availability by 2003-a forecast that Autodata has beaten by two years.

Autodata's newest platform empowers today's automotive online enterprise to effortlessly deploy research, buy and order applications that demand a superior level of functionality, including matching models to specific customer needs, assembling competitive comparisons, customizing editorial content and integrating digital media-all for millions of possible model configurations. Autodata's proprietary Cross Brand Indexing technology (CBI) even allows automatic cross-brand configuration, dynamic cross-brand comparisons, cross-brand feature needs matching, translation to legacy Dealer Software Provider (DSP) systems and cross-brand inventory matching-all critical capabilities for currently emerging, ultra-complex locate-to-order (LTO) and BTO processes.

Autodata has developed one of the most robust and most exhaustive vehicle data warehouses in the industry. The company has cross-indexed the equipment, pricing and ordering rules content of all available North American vehicles, from the current model year all the way back to 1992-a fact that makes the technology an invaluable tool for both new and used car applications. This central repository of data allows users to quickly and efficiently "mine" and specify an almost infinite number of variables, including automatic cross- brand configurations and standardized cross-brand inventory searches.

As automotive configuration, location and order processes continue to move online, Autodata's latest technology is designed to enable not only a smooth, but speedy and accurate transition. This latest XML version continues Autodata's record of innovation by establishing another industry benchmark. Autodata's original XML-based data warehouse, which debuted in December 2000, also broke new ground by delivering the first open standard to an industry grappling with integrating dozens of differing data formats and languages.