Sterling Commerce extends multi-enterprise collaboration and supports business growth at videogame publisher Ubisoft

Sterling Commerce, the multi-enterprise collaboration company, today announced that Ubisoft, one of the leading companies in the videogame industry, has extended its relationship with the company by selecting Sterling Commerces business process management (BPM) solution, Sterling Integrator. With the Sterling Commerce solution, Ubisoft can improve its supply chain visibility and efficiency and capitalise on the growth potential of the European entertainment software market, which Screen Digest predicts will increase by seven percent to $7bn by 2007[1].

Sterling Integrator, built on the Sterling Commerce Multi-Enterprise Services Architecture (MESA), and purposely designed to improve collaboration outside the four walls of an enterprise, will optimise communications management between Ubisoft and its external partners across the UK, France, Germany, Switzerland and Belgium.

With its multi-enterprise capabilities, particularly relating to end-to-end control over shared business processes required for successful partner collaboration, Sterling Integrator also will strengthen Ubisofts logistics flow and product distribution to retail giants such as Carrefour and Auchan. In addition, Ubisoft will benefit from having purchase orders, inventory figures, product codes, date orders and master data shared electronically on a more efficient supply chain management system, providing improved visibility into business processes and events throughout the supply chain.

Ubisoft, publisher of award-winning games such as Prince of Persia Warrior WithinTM and Tom Clancys Splinter Cell Chaos TheoryTM, acknowledges the significant role Sterling Commerces multi-enterprise collaboration solutions have played in its rapid growth.

Using the new solution, message mapping has now been reduced from 10 days to less than five days, drastically improving our delivery times to retail outlets, said Mlanie Pire, EMEA operations manager for Ubisoft. This improvement in our distribution process has been vital to our business. We release 200 new games every year and ensuring the latest version of our products reaches the shelves of our large European retail customers quickly and efficiently underlines the quality of our distribution system and gives us a tremendous competitive advantage."

Antoine Leroy, European IT manager in Ubisofts IT department added: Manual intervention was previously necessary to confirm that orders had been sent correctly, which put extra pressure on our IT department to constantly manage the order process. Sterling Integrator ensures any message failures are reassigned automatically. The IT department can now concentrate on higher-value tasks, saving the company money and allowing us to concentrate on our core business, which is capitalising on the growth potential within the gaming industry.

Ubisoft previously operated a custom-built, complex and costly proprietary tool that limited its business ability to effectively communicate with EMEA partners across their disparate systems. The Sterling Commerce multi-enterprise collaboration solution solved this challenge as its standards-based architecture helps manage cost and complexity across all interface formats and systems.

Spencer Marlow, retail/CPG solutions manager EMEA at Sterling Commerce added: Our multi-enterprise collaboration solution will help reinforce relationships with preferred suppliers and provide a competitive advantage to Ubisoft by allowing the company the flexibility to easily and quickly add partners to its network and work with additional warehouses and partners to meet the demands of the growing videogame business.

Ubisoft is rolling out the solution in the EMEA region, with long-term plans to expand globally.

[1] Screen Digest, Interactive Leisure Software: Market Assessment and Forecast to 2007; Aug 04.