Automotive System Supplier Wilhelm Karmann to Purchase 900 Seats of ENOVIAPM to Optimize Development at Five Global Plants

Automotive system supplier Wilhelm Karmann GmbH, IBM* and ENOVIA Corp.** today jointly announced that Karmann will purchase 900 seats of the ENOVIAPM** product data management solution to help optimize development processes at its five global plants.

Osnabruck, Germany - July 23rd, 1998--Karmann said ENOVIAPM will be used for product data and document management and for the administration of processes used in the release and distribution of data throughout the product life cycle. ENOVIAPM will enable comprehensive access to information from Karmann locations in Germany, the United States, Brazil and Portugal.

Karmann also said today it is participating as an early user in efforts by the ENOVIA Corp.’s to develop the Virtual Product Development solution, named ENOVIAVPM** (Virtual Product Model).

"One of our highest priorities is the implementation of a fully integrated, process-driven product development cycle. We expect ENOVIAPMto further reduce our throughput times. The IBM partnership will enable us to participate actively in ENOVIA's product developments, which are important to our company," said Rainer Thieme, Karmann's Chairman of the Board.

Added Stephen Murdoch, global PDM II Business Director for IBM, "We are delighted to have Karmann as an ENOVIAPM customer. We are proud to be helping Karmann move towards its vision of an all digital factory where products, processes and resources can be modeled and simulated to allow more innovative and much faster product development."

Joel Lemke, Chief Executive Officer of ENOVIA Corp., said "Our customers want to bring better products to market faster and that's what we're helping them do with our integrated world-class product lines. We are delighted to have Karmann as a partner in the development of the ENOVIAVPM product line."