Corporate Express Selected as 2006 Corporate Tax Innovation Award Winner.

Vertex honors winner with charitable donation to City of Hope

BERWYN, Pa. -- Vertex Inc., the world's leading provider of tax technology solutions, recently presented Corporate Express Inc. with the 2006 Corporate Tax Innovation Award at Vertex([R]) Exchange[TM], Vertex's annual customer conference held in Las Vegas. Each year, Vertex recognizes companies who have demonstrated an innovative approach to solving their business needs.

As a winner of this year's award, Corporate Express received a prestigious crystal award along with a $1,000 donation to the charity of their choice. To receive the Vertex charitable donation, Corporate Express chose City of Hope, an innovative biomedical research, treatment, and educational institution dedicated to the prevention and cure of cancer and other life-threatening diseases, and the national charity of the office products industry.

"We are proud to be able to support such a great organization. We have employees that have been personally touched by City of Hope, and their experiences have heightened the company's enthusiasm for City of Hope and what it accomplishes," said Mark Hoffman, CEO of Corporate Express North America.

Corporate Express, one of the world's largest business-to-business suppliers of essential office and computer products and services, received this year's Corporate Innovation Award for several innovations that were employed to help them more effectively utilize tax data reports to meet tax filing deadlines efficiently and with minimal human intervention.

In addition, Corporate Express now has the capability to analyze historical data within Vertex O Series reporting databases to accurately and efficiently respond to customer state and local tax inquiries and support both internal and external auditing efforts. To assist their tax department in making proactive decisions regarding tax rate and rule changes, Corporate Express has created a method for ensuring that staff is informed of critical changes in data by automatically extracting new information from Vertex Reports, and disseminating the information through e-mail communications.

"The Corporate Tax Innovation Awards are designed to recognize innovative practices and processes, which utilize Vertex tax technology, implemented by corporate tax departments for tax compliance success," said Jeff Westphal, Vertex CEO and President. "At Vertex, we develop technology tools to facilitate success, but it is the tax professionals who put the technology to work in an innovative way, tailored to their company's specific needs."

Entries for the Corporate Innovation Awards were reviewed by an independent judging panel and were judged according to a list of criteria, including uniqueness of idea; alignment of program, process or technology with overall organizational goals; ability to translate into a "best of breed" application that can be adapted for use within other organizations; cost effectiveness and scalability; and willingness to counsel other tax professionals interested in implementing similar programs.

About Vertex Inc.

Vertex Inc. is the leading provider of tax technology solutions featuring products and process management services customers worldwide. Vertex solutions help companies streamline tax compliance processes and leverage information to discover new strategic tax savings that enhance decision information across every major line of business tax including income, sales, consumer use, value added, communications, and payroll. To serve its customers, Vertex works in partnership with leading software and service providers.

Founded in 1978, Vertex is a privately held company that employs over 600 professionals at its headquarters in Berwyn, Pa., and offices in Atlanta, Dallas, Phoenix, Sarasota, and Washington, D.C.

For more information about Vertex, visit our Web site at www.vertexinc.com.