papiNet and XBITS Announce a 45 Day Public Review Period for Version 2.10 with 5 Messages Designed to Enhance Electronic Business Communications in the Book Manufacturing Industry

XBITS and papiNet, the global electronic standards initiatives for the book manufacturing, paper, and forest products industries, announce a 45-day public review period for 5 new business documents. The new documents, or messages, enable book manufacturing supply chain companies to communicate purchase order and delivery information.

Brussels and Alexandria, VA (January 27, 2003) - The members and sponsoring organizations of papiNet- the global electronic standards initiative of the paper and forest products industry - announce a 45-day public review period for five business documents, or messages, modified for the book manufacturing industry by their XBITS Working Group. The messages being submitted for public review are Purchase Order, Order Confirmation, Order Status, Delivery, and ShippingInstructions.

After the public review period these messages will become the book manufacturing industry standard for suppliers and customers to electronically communicate business transactions involved in the procurement, order fulfillment, and delivery processes. The standards development process will continue with new messages being designed to support business processes in transportation, manufacturing, and inventory management processes.

The public is invited to review the proposed additions to the papiNet standard and comment on them during the 45-day review period from January 30 to March 14, 2003. The proposed messages can be downloaded from http://www.papinet.org/review.asp.

In addition to the information on the proposed messages, complete documentation for the published messages is available on the papiNet web site. Implementation guide, case study, and data coordination tools are also available. papiNet plans include establishing Segment Implementation Groups (SIGs) to support further adoption of the standard by market segment. Visit www.papinet.org for further information.

About papiNet

The purpose of papiNet is to develop, maintain, and support the implementation of global electronic business transaction standards for parties engaged in the buying, selling and distribution of forest and paper products. The aim is to improve the reach and richness of communication throughout the supply chain, increase efficiencies in transactions, and to support interoperability among trading partners. The papiNet standards are open and freely available. Critical mass is achieved by involving key players globally and across the supply chain.

Nearly 50 customers, producers, and technology firms from Europe and North America are involved in the initiative with industry association partners - American Forest and Paper Association, Confederation of European Paper Industries (CEPI), and International Digital Enterprise Alliance (IDEAlliance). Visit www.papinet.org for further information.

About XBITS

XBITS (XML Book Industry Transaction Standards) is an IDEAlliance (International Digital Enterprise Alliance) Working Group composed of major book publishers, printers, paper mills, and component vendors. The goal of XBITS is to design XML (Extensible Markup Language) based transactions to facilitate bi-directional electronic data exchanges within the book manufacturing supply chain through the application of the papiNet development process. Visit www.xmlbits.org for further information.

Contacts:

Eric Olofsson
papiNet Chairman
eric.olofsson@storaenso.com
+46 (0) 8 613 6600

Arthur Colman
papiNet Technical Lead
colman@drybridge.com
+1 617 803 2546