1. For more information, contact:
Julie Redard, Sterling Commerce, 978-513-6386; julie_redard@stercomm.com
Jamie Leicht, Fleishman-Hillard, 619-237-7711; leichtj@fleishman.com
Sterling Commerce Announces Customer Connection
2007 Innovation Awards
Customers Recognized for Their Success in the Innovative Application of
Technology to Solve Complex Business Challenges
DENVER, Sterling Commerce Customer Connection, Aug. 23, 2007 — At its annual
user conference, Sterling Commerce, an AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) subsidiary, today
announced the winners of the Customer Connection 2007 Innovation Awards, which
recognize innovation in using technology to address complex business challenges. The
winners represent a variety of industries but have one common denominator: They have
found a method to connect with their business communities in a way that has
accelerated growth while reducing costs.
Companies recognized for their leadership in innovation included:
• Ball Corp., one of the world's leading suppliers of metal and plastic packaging to
the beverage, food and household-products industries.
• Best Buy, North America’s number one specialty consumer electronics retail
store.
• CF Industries, one of the largest manufacturers and distributors of nitrogen and
phosphate fertilizer products in North America.
• GE Money, the consumer and small business financial services unit of General
Electric.
• Panalpina World Transport Ltd., one of the world's leading suppliers of
forwarding and logistics services.
• Parker-Hannifin, the global leader in motion and control technologies.

2. “In today’s global economy, companies face complex business process integration
challenges — challenges in how they work with their business community,” said Eric
Meerschaert, vice president of global marketing for Sterling Commerce. “These
companies are innovators in their industries and have found and implemented best
practices and solutions to overcome barriers to success, such as rapidly changing
business and technical requirements and cumbersome manual and inflexible automated
processes.”
As one example of innovation, the information technology department at Ball Corp. was
able to align successfully with the business to provide additional value in meeting Ball’s
business objectives. With a goal to provide its customers with an overall experience that
makes them want to continue doing business with the company, Ball Corp. used Sterling
Collaborative Network and Gentran Integration Suite™ (GIS) to streamline and automate
the business processes that link the company with its trading partners. The company
increased the quality of data, improved customer service and decreased costs.
Another company recognized for innovation was Best Buy, which thrives by putting the
customer at the core of its business. The company used the Sterling Selling and
Fulfillment Suite to provide a consistent multi-channel customer experience and order-
fulfillment process across its BestBuy.com site and retail stores.
GE Money was recognized for its strategic use of GIS as a business-to-business (B2B)
communications platform to make its business more agile. GIS supports multiple
communications and security protocols and enables the company to more easily
accommodate customer and partner requirements. In addition, the company gained a
flexible, automated interface to easily integrate new partners, new business processes
and new protocols. This interface enables the company to respond quickly to new
opportunities.
In addition to its work with these companies, Sterling Commerce has a customer base of
more than 30,000 that includes all of the top 10 specialty retailers, nine of the top 10
CPG manufacturers and nine of the top 10 banking/financial services firms. Sterling
Commerce provides business applications and integration solutions to help companies
improve profitability, minimize risks and thrive in a global economy. The company’s

3. business application solutions for multi-channel selling and fulfillment manage the end-
to-end orchestration of complex order lifecycles. Its integration solutions for data and
files, enterprise applications and B2B communications conquer complex process-
integration challenges.
About Sterling Commerce
Sterling Commerce, a subsidiary of AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T), helps customers thrive in a global economy by
connecting their business communities, processes, people and technology. More than 30,000 customers
worldwide – including 80 percent of the Fortune 500 – use Sterling Commerce solutions for business
process integration, multi-channel selling, and supply chain execution to improve profitability inside and
outside their company walls. Headquartered in Columbus, Ohio, Sterling Commerce has offices in 19
countries and most major cities around the world. For more information, please go to
www.sterlingcommerce.com.
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