Gloucester, Mass., April 25, 2006 — TradeStone Software, the leader in enabling domestic and international sourcing through a Unified Buying Process, today released TradeStone for Trading and Product Development Companies, the latest addition to its popular TradeStone Suite™. Through a series of customer-driven enhancements, TradeStone for Trading and Product Development Companies supports organizations in the collaborative development of their products and brands, allowing them to create Product Line/Collection offerings to their customers or internal departments. As Buyers narrow their selections to a collection within the line, the results on buying budgets and initial mark-up within a delivery and floor set is dynamically presented.

Central to TradeStone for Trading and Product Development Companies is the Collection Review within the Virtual Showroom, a secure online workspace that enables local retail buyers and merchants to select pieces, as well as attributes (cuts, colors, sizes, packaging) from a general collection so they can create local brand extensions of private labeled merchandise. The Virtual Showroom provides a sophisticated way for buyers and merchants to examine the Line by Collection, summarized by selling-channel, delivery period, class and sub-classes. The visual presentation of Product Lines and Collection portfolios gives buyers the speed to market they require to make changes that influence and determine future flows to stores at the color, size and style level based on market trends. The central buying group at the Trading Company and/or Product Development Company can collect all the local orders in real time and compare selections and make recommendations based on known volume discounts. Understanding what their local stores want to sell during the season, Trading and Product Development Companies can adjust mark-up percentages, compare the projected selling price to the estimated landed cost and forecast margins per item by distribution.

According to TradeStone Software CEO, Sue Welch, many brands become locked into generic product portfolios, not by design but by necessity to serve a multitude of markets. Product portfolios are often developed around a "most common" denominator – a specification or attribute that will serve the largest demographic contingent. This generic offering can erode a brand, or worse, interfere with quarterly earnings opportunities.

"In order to deliver fresh and innovative product, on trend and on time, to unique geographies and end consumers, product development companies and retailers need tools to work collaboratively with their global manufacturers and their global outlets," Welch said. "TradeStone recognizes the changing roles of retailers and Trading Companies as they take on the challenges of developing products and acting as their own Private Brand companies. TradeStone for Trading and Product Development Companies addresses those changing roles and provides a platform and functionality to meet those needs."

Orders for Product within a collection can be grouped and split into Factory Orders. Factories and Trading company buyers/product managers collaborate on the orders to refine product flow by color, size, pre-pack, etc., as changes to market demand impact customer order flows. These modifications and change orders are automatically date stamped, creating a complete order history. This change-tracking is critical, providing a financial and merchandise view of sourced items across all production phases. The Plan/Buy List provides a comparison between financial plans and execution of pre-buy requested quantities, on-order commitments for a period by department/class/sub-class.

"Every major retailer goes through various stages of sourcing, starting with buying domestically to importing, to establishing a strong private label brand, which is typically sourced globally. The difference in profit margins at each step in the sourcing value chain is dramatic – typically starting at 45 percent and peaking at 75 percent," notes TradeStone CEO Sue Welch. "TradeStone for Trading and Product Development Companies enables retailers to better leverage their sourcing margins for all their customers. And when all their customers have more profitable collections, Wall Street takes notice."

The Virtual Showroom is part of the overall TradeStone Suite, a set of Web-based application modules which includes Product, Sourcing, Logistics, Finance, Product Lifecycle Management and Unified Order Management. The Suite provides retailers with the technology infrastructure they need to manage all aspects of the purchasing process, while providing a real-time view into each step.

In addition to the Virtual Showroom, TradeStone for Trading and Product Development Companies includes a series of usability enhancements to provide greater insight into all activities within the buying process, addressing areas including:

• Regulation—TradeStone for Trading and Product Development Companies makes it simple to view the changes made to any transaction by anyone within the supply chain, a critical feature when demonstrating compliance with regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley or BASEL II.
• Security—In order to fit easily into existing corporate security policies, TradeStone for Trading and Product Development Companies features many security enhancements, including hierarchical permission structures, password protection and change-tracking.
• Dynamic Data—TradeStone for Trading and Product Development Companies features Smart Tags, an interactive hyperlink utility that drills down to critical information, enabling users to display more detailed information at the click of a button.

About TradeStone Software, Inc.
TradeStone Software enables retailers and manufacturers to plan, design, collaborate on and purchase goods from across the world as easily as from across the street. TradeStone's Unified Buying Engine uses Web services technology to layer across an organization's existing infrastructure while its modular software fills in buying process gaps to provide a single view, access and interaction across the entire procurement process. The first and only complete solution for global sourcing, product lifecycle management, and unified order management, TradeStone's intuitive "No Training" technology helps people throughout the supply chain to collaborate globally, enabling users to focus on speeding innovative products to market. Marquee customers include American Eagle Outfitters, The Children's Place, Deutsche Woolworth, Ocean State Job Lot, Pacific Alliance and Federated Department Stores. TradeStone Software is based in Gloucester, Mass. and can be found on the Web at http://www.TradeStoneSoftware.com.

Contact:

Tania Stockbridge
TradeStone Software
978-281-3723
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