Leading Organizations Worldwide Save Application Development Costs and Time with Oracle(r) Application Express

Corporate Express Deutschland GmbH, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, and Shell Canada Develop Scalable and Secure Web Applications with Oracle Application Express, Formerly Named Oracle HTML DB.

REDWOOD SHORES, CA, 30-JAN-2006 Organizations of all sizes and across different industries throughout the globe are utilizing Oracle(r) Application Express to easily build, deploy and manage secure Web applications using only a Web browser. Companies taking advantage of Oracle Application Express to build critical Web applications include Corporate Express Deutschland GmbH, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, and Shell Canada. Oracle Application Express was previously named Oracle HTML DB.

Oracle Application Express is a Web-based application development tool integrated with Oracle9i Database Release 2 and all releases of Oracle Database 10g. It enables anyone with limited programming experience and a Web browser to rapidly develop scalable Web applications that can be quickly deployed to tens, hundreds or thousands of users. Over 175,000 users have downloaded Oracle Application Express since its initial release in February 2004.

“Oracle Application Express is a popular Oracle Database feature that delivers immediate and significant value to users,” said Andy Mendelsohn, senior vice president of Database Server Technologies, Oracle. “Users familiar with desktop productivity tools such as spreadsheets are finding Oracle Application Express is an easy tool to build secure Web applications that can take advantage of the performance, reliability, and scalability of Oracle Database.”

Global Organizations Benefit from Oracle Application Express Ease-of-Use, Versatility
Corporate Express is one of the world’s largest business-to-business suppliers of essential office and computer products and services. Corporate Express forms part of Buhrmann, the world’s largest supplier of office products, paper and graphic systems for the business market. Oracle Application Express enabled Corporate Express Deutschland GmbH to produce a user friendly and efficient self service billing management system that integrated with order management and account receivable modules from two distinct ERP (enterprise resource planning) systems, including Oracle Applications. Their Oracle Application Express system was built by the internal IT staff, avoiding costs associated with hiring external application developers. “Oracle Application Express is a highly productive Web development tool for us,” said Holger Kiessling, IT Manager, Corporate Express Deutschland GmbH, Stuttgart. “Using Oracle Application Express, we were able to deliver a solution that features great performance, integrates with existing ERP systems, including Oracle Applications, and has tremendous end user acceptance.”

Based in the Boston suburb of Wellesley, the not-for-profit Harvard Pilgrim Health Care (HPHC) provides medical coverage for more than 910,000 people in Massachusetts, Maine, and New Hampshire. HPHC is committed to using e-business technology and the Internet to deliver better services at a lower cost. “Harvard Pilgrim Health Care has created more than a dozen applications with Oracle Application Express, ranging from a few pages to over 150,” said Larry Rapisarda, Chief Technology Officer, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care. “We continue to choose Oracle Application Express because it allows us to quickly implement a requirement and rapidly adapt to changing business needs. End users appreciate the ability to participate in rapid design sessions that provide functioning prototypes. Developers like it for the same reason.”

Shell Canada Limited is one of the largest integrated petroleum companies in Canada, producing natural gas, natural gas liquids and bitumen. It is the country’s largest producer of sulfur as well as a leading manufacturer, distributor and marketer of refined petroleum products. Shell Canada relied on Oracle Application Express to build a change approval application for its team of database administrators (DBAs) to manage and track the hundreds of changes to its databases. “I’m impressed with the Oracle Application Express feature of Oracle Database,” said Wayne Linton, Senior DBA, Shell Canada Limited. “We have used it to help deliver a number of feature-rich, browser-based business applications in an amazingly short timeframe. The change approval application helps us to meet our audit and Sarbanes-Oxley compliance requirements.”

Availability
Oracle Application Express (formerly Oracle HTML DB) is available for download from the Oracle Technology Network at:
www.oracle.com/technology/products/database/application_express/download.html

The tool is integrated with Oracle9i Database Release 2 and all releases of Oracle Database 10g at no additional cost. For more information on Oracle Application Express, go to:
http://otn.oracle.com/apex.

About Oracle
Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL) is the world’s largest enterprise software company. For more information about Oracle, visit our Web site at http://www.oracle.com.

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Eloy Ontiveros

Oracle

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