Epicor Achieves Progress Software Partner of the Year

Epicor Software Corporation (NASDAQ: EPIC), a leading provider of integrated enterprise software solutions for the midmarket, today announced it was named 2004 Partner of the Year by The OpenEdge Division, an operating unit of Progress Software Corporation (NASDAQ: PRGS) and a leading supplier of technology for building business applications. Progress selects its partner award recipients based on their innovative use of Progress OpenEdge technology, their focus on high-value initiatives, and various collaborative efforts that have allowed them to deliver maximum business value in a slow economy.

This marks the third year in a row that Epicor has received the top honor, Partner of the Year, for demonstrating success in the delivery of a broad range of end-user manufacturing solutions, using a single set of advanced business logic processes based on the Progress OpenEdge platform.

"Epicor has demonstrated success in delivering a wide range of Progress-based solutions to midmarket manufacturers," said David Ireland, president of the Progress Company. "We are pleased to recognize application partners like Epicor that leverage the flexibility, productivity, efficiency and scalability of the Progress OpenEdge Platform in developing innovative business solutions for customers."

Leveraging both the Progress OpenEdge and Microsoft .NET platforms, Epicor delivered Vantage 8.0 this year, the industrys first manufacturing solution based on a 100-percent service-oriented architecture (SOA) and optimized for high performance and collaboration across the globally expanding supply chain. Vantage 8.0 is completely architected from the ground up to support growing market requirements for service-oriented architectures, which enables businesses to leverage best-in-class software services through open industry standards, simplifying application development and integration.

Were honored to be acknowledged for the third consecutive year by Progress for our accomplishments in delivering industry leading enterprise solutions to manufacturers around the world, said George Klaus, chairman, CEO and president of Epicor. The Partner of the Year award is further validation of our position in delivering innovative technology solutions to our customers that enable them to increase efficiency and productivity across their business, while promoting a rapid return on investment and low total cost of ownership.