VALLEY FORGE, Pa.--Oct. 19, 2004-- IKON Office Solutions, the world's largest independent channel for document management systems and services, today announced a new strategic relationship with Kofax, the world's largest information capture vendor. Through this relationship, Kofax's industry-leading Ascent Capture technology will be integrated into IKON's portfolio of end-to-end document solutions, enabling fast, reliable information collection and high volume, complex image processing in the capture phase of the document lifecycle. "Information capture is a critical stage in the document lifecycle," stated Michael Kohlsdorf, Senior Vice President of IKON Enterprise Services - IKON's global services organization. "Kofax's Ascent Capture provides robust capabilities on top of a proven automated process. Tightly integrated within an IKON-delivered end-to-end solution, customers can be confident that information is accurate and accessible throughout essential business workflows and applications." Ideal for office and high-volume production environments, Ascent Capture transforms paper documents and data into retrievable information through an automated capture process. Productivity and workflow improvements are easily achieved through Ascent Capture's ability to capture information in almost any format and feed it into business applications and complex workflow environments. In addition, Ascent Capture allows for information to be collected from traditional capture devices, such as scanners and electronic sources, and delivered into commonly deployed content and document management systems, workflow applications and databases. "With Ascent Capture, IKON has the ability to integrate a versatile information capture solution that collects large volumes of documents, transforms them into useful electronic information, and then delivers it all into a variety of workflow and document management systems," said Anthony Macciola, Vice President of Development and Marketing at Kofax. "As a solution provider for IKON's integrated document solutions portfolio, Kofax looks forward to working with IKON to help customers maximize the productivity and workflow improvements that Ascent Capture creates." IKON, which deploys a team of 1,000 Professional Services specialists supported by more than 5,000 sales professionals, is focused on increasing efficiency, productivity and cost savings for customers throughout the document lifecycle. At the document capture phase, for example, IKON can help eliminate the processing of paper documents by leveraging Ascent Capture's forms processing tools, which extract information from forms such as invoices and bills of lading. "IKON brings together best-in-class software like Kofax's Ascent Capture alongside dedicated consulting and professional services to give customers the advantage of a reliable, tailored document management solution without sacrificing previous technology investments," added Kohlsdorf.