Blaze Software Enhances Business Rule Management and Extends Support for Leading E-Business Platforms With Blaze Advisor 3.1.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 18, 2000

New Support for Brokat Twister, GemStone/J, iPlanet, Windows 2000

Blaze Software, Inc. (Nasdaq: BLZE), the leading supplier of "Beyond Personalization(TM)" e-business solutions, today announced enhanced business rule management capabilities and support for leading e-business platforms with the shipment of the Blaze Advisor Solutions Suite(TM)release 3.1.

The Blaze Advisor Solutions Suite is an integrated family of products designed to capture the policies, practices, and procedures--or business rules--that drive day-to-day business activity. As a part of the suite, Blaze Advisor(TM) Innovator lets corporate policymakers independently create and change business policies and procedures that drive the e-business process intelligence behind business practices such as online campaigns, cross-selling and up-selling, and customer relationship management. Policies and other business rules can be defined over the Web without programming and without specialized development environments.

"The new enhancements to Blaze Advisor enable our customers to better manage and deploy the business rules that drive the personalized interactions offered to their customers, employees, and business partners," said Eric Kintzer, vice president and chief technical officer at Blaze Software. "The new functionality in release 3.1 makes Blaze Advisor rules-based personalization even more user-friendly and scaleable for business managers in charge of successfully growing and operating e-business and customer relationship management programs."

Extensions to platform support, additional programming guides and examples, and rule definition enhancements make it even easier and faster for companies to integrate advanced rules-based personalization into their applications. Reduced reliance on specialized programming talent and more intuitive rule definition create opportunities for faster time to market and an increased competitive edge.

The improved Blaze Advisor Solutions Suite 3.1 includes the following enhancements in functionality and support for the Blaze Advisor product family:

-- Support for Application Service-Specific Rule Maintenance - Application
Service Providers (ASPs) and other customers who wish to maintain rule
conditions for different use cases may now do so with Blaze Advisor Innovator
in release 3.1. A basic structure for a set of rules may be defined once and
referred to in dedicated rule files to cover use by different subscriber
clients, geographical locations, or business divisions. For instance, an auto
insurer always needs to check whether the applicant is of driving age. However
legal driving age varies from state to state and country to country. A single
rule can be defined to continue or abort an insurance application process based
on the applicant's age. At runtime, Blaze Advisor automatically inserts the
appropriate age limitation value depending on the applicant's residence. Value
replacement simplifies rule definition, maintenance, and application
complexity. The ability to create rule services with client-specific rule
components is a unique feature provided only by Blaze Software.

-- More Intuitive Business Rule Language - Blaze Advisor 3.1 introduces
additional rule language keywords that let business managers more intuitively
create and update rules with familiar, every-day business language. Rules may
be written with common English words and phrases such as "is equal to," "plus,"
"minus," "at least," "between," and many more. Blaze Advisor even understands
possessive nouns to indicate object properties, such as "the automobile's
price." A representative business rule may be written: "If the customer's age
is between 16 and 25 then the riskfactor is 1.16" rather than using Java "dot
notation" and arithmetic symbols (although these methods remain available as
well at the developer's choosing). Language extensions and additional options
for rule authoring are part of the continuing improvements in ease of use and
flexibility of the Blaze Advisor Solutions Suite.

-- More Choices for Developing Custom Rule Maintenance Screens - Application
developers designing Blaze Advisor Innovator rule maintenance screens for use
by non-technical employees may now use Active Server Pages (ASP), Swing, and
Visual Basic as well as JSP tags to link the rule maintenance screens to rules
and values used in their application. Blaze Software continues to expand its
list of supported technologies to ensure that customers can make the easiest
and most efficient use of our products no matter what their preferred technical
environment may be.

-- Extended Support for Leading E-Business Platforms - The Blaze Advisor Rule
Server is now supported on the Brokat Twister, GemStone/J(R), Microsoft
Transaction Server (MTS), and Sun iPlanet(TM) platforms. Full integration
guides and examples are included with the product documentation. With this
additional support, companies can integrate their Blaze Advisor business rules
across more e-business systems that directly touch their customers. Other
Application Server platforms from industry-leading vendors such as BEA and IBM
remain supported, offering customers a wealth of platform choices.

-- Windows 2000 support - The Blaze Advisor Solutions Suite is now fully
supported on Microsoft Windows 2000. Customers may deploy business rule
applications on the full range of current Microsoft Windows operating systems,
backed by documentation and technical support from Blaze Software.

-- Development Environment Supported on Sun Solaris - Blaze Advisor Builder has
been tested and documented for use with the Sun Solaris(TM) operating system.
Companies using Solaris as their development platform choice can now develop
their complete business rule-driven applications on Solaris software without
needing to install and support Microsoft Windows as well.

Blaze Advisor creates an interactive enterprise that treats the customer consistently and personally over a wide variety of contact points - much like a company's best customer service representative. Blaze Software helps companies build closer relationships with customers while increasing sales and loyalty in four unique ways:

-- True one-to-one interactions are created through unique

sessions driven by Blaze Advisor rules that create interactive

dialogues and personalized recommendations based on a

customer's goals. These customer interactions employ lifelike,

interactive dialogue to cross-sell, upsell, and perform

goal-driven configuration on a one-to-one basis.

-- Business process personalization incorporates a company's way

of doing business and treating its customers in every aspect

of business operations. Automated policies, practices, and

procedures encapsulated in Blaze Advisor business rules allow

the company's personality to shine through in every

transaction.

-- Adaptive personality responds in real time to changing

competition, internal business practices, government

regulations, and customer behaviors to provide the most

appropriate and effective treatment of each customer

transaction. Blaze Advisor Innovator enables business managers

to change business rules on-the-fly via the Web to react to

these marketplace changes at any time.

-- Enterprise consistency means maintaining the same business

methodologies no matter how, when, or where customers,

employees, suppliers, or partners interact with the

enterprise. Blaze Advisor business rules operate across

various customer contact points such as the Web, call centers,

kiosks, ATMs, or wireless devices and the rules interact with

information gathered from previous customer visits - creating

a consistent, streamlined customer service experience.

About Blaze Software

Blaze Software, Inc. (Nasdaq: BLZE) is a leading provider of rules-based e-business software enabling adaptable and personalized interaction that is consistent across all contact points. The Blaze Advisor Solutions Suite, written entirely in the Java programming language, is designed to give e-business applications more personalized interaction for users, which can lead to greater customer retention, decreased costs, and increased sales. Blazed applications can be changed on the fly, allowing e-business offerings to respond quickly to changing market conditions, business practices, and customer preferences. Blaze Software's personalization solutions are constructed to be extended easily across contact points (Web, email, call centers) and across processes (customer, employee, partner, and supplier).

Blaze Software powers e-business projects for more than 200 customers in the high technology, financial, insurance, manufacturing, telecommunications, and healthcare industries, and Blaze Software products are embedded in leading e-business software packages. Blaze Software offers complete support for implementations across extended enterprises and within software applications, including training, consulting, and integration services. Blaze Software is headquartered in San Jose, California, and maintains a global network of subsidiaries and resellers in North and South America, Europe, Australia, and Asia. For more information, visit www.blazesoft.com.

Blaze Software, Blaze Advisor, Blaze Advisor Solutions Suite, and Beyond Personalization are trademarks of Blaze Software, Inc. Java is a registered trademark of Sun Microsystems, Inc. Other names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.