Niles, Illinois - April 28, 2003 - Fort Dearborn Company is pleased to be the founding customer sponsor behind today’s announcement by FLEXSTOR to place its industry-leading, J2EE architected Digital Asset Management software, Flex-db into Open Source. “The DAM system plays a critical role in helping us manage customer assets, reduce cycle time, and improve brand consistency. Placing FLEX-db into open source establishes the standard infrastructure platform for brand management” commented Rich Adler, Fort Dearborn Company President & Chief Quality Officer. Fort Dearborn has lead the package decoration industry by providing digital asset management services through VirtualGateway, an in-house development effort that now transitions to incorporate Flex-db, with Flex-si and dbLink to manage a global federation of brand asset repositories. “We chose FLEXSTOR for its three-tiered J2EE architecture and dbLink technology. This essentially gives us a business system integration platform with an enterprise DAM service at its core. Placing Flex-db into open source establishes the enduring trust that allows us to develop value-added applications with confidence in the long-term vitality of the core DAM platform.” said Murray Oles, Fort Dearborn Company Chief Technology Architect. Flex-db is installed at FDC’s Elk Grove Illinois prepress facility, VirtualColor, on Oracle 9i RAC with Veritas clustering software managing dual Sun V480 servers connected through Brocade switches to an EMC CX-600 Storage Area Network. This highly available configuration is backed up by a fully integrated ADIC tape library controlled by Bridgehead software giving Fort Dearborn customers up to 164 terabytes of on-line and near-line hierarchical storage. Digital asset management is a logical extension of the services that we provide our customers. This scaleable system provides Fort Dearborn and its customers with a highly reliable and virtually unlimited storage capacity to manage their full range of their brand related assets.