Innovative Solution Enhances Advertisers' Experience, Optimizes ad Placement

Valassis, one of the nation's leading media and marketing services companies, announced today that it made this year's InformationWeek 500, an annual listing of the nation's most innovative users of business technology. This is the third consecutive year Valassis has been named to this prestigious list. The company was recognized for the development of its Advanced Booking Engine (ABE), a solution that optimizes ad placement requests for its clients in a fraction of time with a 98% improvement rate.

The ABE has resulted in better ad placement for Valassis' shared mail advertising clients, providing them:

• *date flexibility;
• *the option for alternate date placement;
• *the ability to make changes later in the process; and
• *reduced lead times.

This efficient solution automates what was a manual process and cuts the process time by more than half. Additionally, it provides analytics for current and future planning that previously was not available.

"As a company, we operate with speed, urgency and energy and we applied those competencies to this project," said Steve Carrington, Valassis Chief Information Officer. "We were able to develop an innovative solution by applying proven technology to our unique business situation and deliver an application that enhances both our business and that of our clients."

Utilizing a cross-functional team, a plan was developed to improve speed and agility that would contain the intelligence to systematically optimize ad placement, while incorporating established business rules, allowing more selling time and decreasing the amount of time needed to process the request.

"The InformationWeek 500 has recognized the most innovative users of business technology for 24 years, and this year's innovations were particularly impressive," said InformationWeek Editor in Chief Rob Preston. "What the editors looked for are unconventional approaches - new technologies, new models, new ways of grabbing business opportunities and solving complex business problems with IT."

The annual list was revealed last night at a gala awards ceremony at the InformationWeek 500 Conference which took place at the St. Regis Monarch Beach Resort, Dana Point, Calif. InformationWeek identifies and honors the nation's most innovative users of information technology with its annual 500 listing, and also tracks the technology, strategies, investments, and administrative practices of America's best-known companies. Past overall winners include PACCAR Inc., The Vanguard Group, CME Group, National Semiconductor, Con-Way, and Principal Financial Group. The InformationWeek 500 rankings are unique among corporate rankings as it spotlights the power of innovation in information technology, rather than simply identifying the biggest IT spenders.  Additional details on the InformationWeek 500 can be found online at www.informationweek.com/iw500/.