4CS and Data Junction Announce Partnership to Optimize Warranty Value Chain

4CS will integrate Data Junction in iWarranty as part of its collaborative approach to warranty management for the automotive industry.

August 19th, 2002 - - 4C Solutions, Inc. (4CS), a leading provider of intelligent warranty software applications, today announced that it has partnered with Data Junction Corporation, developers of the world's most widely deployed integration solutions. The partnership will bring seamless data integration functionality to 4CS's iWarranty, a suite of enterprise warranty management solutions.

"iWarranty, packaged with Data Junction pre-defined data mapping functionality, supports EDI to XML transactions specific to warranty and product registration. If an iWarranty customer has adopted the AIAG EDI standards, it's ready to go out-of-the-box," says Marc Possin, iWarranty Product Manager. "4CS is committed to supporting evolving ebXML standards for business process integration across trading partners and STARXML to integrate with Dealer Business systems."

4CS integration strategy is based on open XML standards and Web services. iWarranty Integrator is a middleware component that allows integration with iWarranty functions using XML and SOAP. Through the support of multiple application formats, Data Junction facilitates movement of data from a variety of outside sources into a common import format. Additionally, Data Junction's abundance of output formats allow 4CS to create custom data sets for their customers in just about any format that the customer requests.

"We are pleased that 4CS has selected Data Junction as the data transformation engine for their warranty product suite," said Mike Hoskins, President of Data Junction. "The uniform process of data mapping between processes and applications will greatly impact iWarranty customers, resulting in tremendous end-user productivity gains."

Enterprises have been struggling for years to efficiently share warranty information, spending millions of dollars creating point to point solutions to move the data in and out of an array of legacy systems. The integration of Data Junction into iWarranty optimizes the flow of information by automating data mapping and transformation, making inefficient point-to-point solutions no longer necessary.

"We are continually looking for ways to reduce warranty cycle times in our solution, and the integration of Data Junction is an excellent demonstration of making these processes much more efficient," states Ashok Kartham, President and Founder of 4CS. Kartham says, "Data Junction's transformation engine is the 'black box' that automatically performs the mapping from one structure and format to another."

With Data Junction, iWarranty is able to significantly reduce the cycle time in moving warranty information, improving early warning capabilities of failures and quality issues, as well as enabling faster recovery of warranty costs from partners and suppliers.

About 4CS
4CS is a leading provider of Service LifeCycle Management (SLM) solutions servicing manufacturers and suppliers in the heavy equipment, truck and automotive industry. SLM focuses on growing the service side of the business and adding customer value after the sale of a product. 4CS's agile and proactive solutions enable enterprises to take an integrated approach to delivering services that increase competitive advantage and help retain customers for life. For more information, please visit or call 800.708.8773.

About Data Junction Corporation
Data Junction Corporation is the market leader in integration technology with more than 40,000 customers. Customers include 75% of the Fortune 500 as well as major consulting firms and software vendors that embed Data Junction's technology. Winner of nearly twenty major industry awards, Data Junction Corporation is a rapidly growing, private company based in Austin, Texas. The company sells directly to VARs and corporations in the United States, the European Union and Latin America, as well as through more than 500 Alliance Partners in the United States and distribution partners throughout the world. For more information, please visit http://www.datajunction.com/ or call 800.580.4411.