International Trade Facilitation: Orange Business Services, Axway, and Sopra Group Launch a Single Window Experimentation

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. and PARIS - Today, the operations of companies exporting from the French territory generate more than 100 million documents per year and 8 million customs declarations*, and involve on average some ten parties for each one.

For this reason, Orange Business Services, Axway, and Sopra Group are now announcing a Single Window experimentation. The experimental platform will be available in June.

The objectives of this Single Window are:

  • to simplify, secure, and accelerate the international trade operations of French businesses;
  • to reduce the cost of administrative procedures while accelerating the process;
  • to provide tracking and security for import/export operations;
  • to facilitate international market access for small and medium sized businesses, for which the complexity of the current procedures proves to be an impediment to their international development.

This Single Window will also allow French businesses to prepare for the new regulations that the future European Union customs code has planned for 2009 in an effort to strengthen the security of import/export operations of European Union countries.

Among the international trade players, Customs, Ubifrance, the Paris Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Bureau Veritas, Soget, and MGI (creators of the AP+ solution used by the Havre and Marseille ports) are already collaborating in this project.

Orange Business Services, a communications service operator and integrator for businesses throughout the world, is bringing to the table its extensive expertise in order to design and operate large-scale trusted party services in the area of B2B, particularly in the public sector.

Axway and Sopra Group have experience in defining and implementing service computerization platforms. As a world leader in "collaborative business solutions", Axway equips more than 20 Asian platforms that currently converse with several tens of thousands of businesses.

* Export figures in France (Source: French Customs)

 

# # #

About Axway

Axway is the Business Interaction Networks company — the only provider in the market today to manage, run, secure, and monitor all of your business interactions, including email, files, messaging, services, events, and processes. Serving over 11,000 organizations in more than 100 countries, Axway facilitates the multi-enterprise transactions, processes and integration that accelerate business by eliminating the barriers between vendors, customers, departments, partners and suppliers. Axway's comprehensive offerings include business-to-business integration, managed file transfer, secure email, business activity monitoring, enterprise application integration, service-oriented architecture, business process management, track & trace and identity validation solutions. Axway provides professional and managed services, as well as cloud computing and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) offerings. Headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona, Axway's global presence spans 20 countries.

About Orange Business Services

Orange Business Services represents the business communications solutions and services provided by the France Telecom Group as of June 1st, 2006. They were previously sold under the France Telecom, Orange, Equant, Etrali, Almerys, EGT, Expertel Consulting, France Telecom Intelmatique, SETIB and Solicia brands. The offers include converged voice, data and mobile services as well as IT expertise and managed services, all designed to transform business processes and improve productivity. Orange Business Services is present in 166 countries and territories and serves customers in 220.Various product and service names referenced herein may be trademarks of their respective owners. www.orange-business.com

About Sopra Group

As a major European player in information systems consulting in Europe, Sopra Group offers all of the services businesses need to have their organizations and information systems evolve. Sopra Group now consists of 10,000 associates. Its positioning is all-inclusive, from pre-project reflection on strategy as part of a general management approach, to the management of major systems integration projects and application outsourcing. In addition, Sopra Group is continuing with worldwide deployment of its application integration activity and field-specific process management activity through its subsidiary Axway with a complete range of solutions and services. www.sopragroup.com

Orange Business Services press contacts:

01 44 44 93 93

Patrick Thielemans, patrick.thielemans@orange-ftgroup.com

Fabienne Moiteaux, fabienne.moiteaux@orange-ftgroup.com

Sopra Group press contacts:

Virginie Legoupil

Direct line: +33 (1) 40 67 29 41 /

Cell: + 33 (6) 70 16 18 35

vlegoupil@sopragroup.com