NOL Group Signs Outsourcing Agreement with Accenture

SINGAPORE; Dec. 17, 2002 -- Global transportation and logistics company Neptune Orient Lines (NOL) and Accenture, the world’s leading management consulting and technology services company, today announced an agreement for the outsourcing of the NOL Group’s transaction-based finance functions.

The eight-year agreement calls for Accenture to assume responsibility for the NOL Group’s accounts payable, accounts receivable and accounts reconciliation processes, with the operations consolidated in Shanghai.

The innovative agreement allows for Accenture to share in a portion of the cost savings it will help the NOL Group achieve.

NOL Group Chief Financial Officer Lim How Teck said the agreement with Accenture is another significant step in the Group’s ongoing drive to streamline finance and accounting processes.

“With Accenture helping us increase the efficiency of our financial transaction processing, the NOL Group is expected to realize average annual cost savings of 30% over the eight years compared with doing the work in-house,” said Lim. “Our core business is transportation and logistics, not financial processing, and it makes good commercial sense to leverage the expertise of Accenture, which has an excellent track record in offering this service to clients around the world.”

“This also allows us to focus our own finance function on core activities that create value for the NOL Group,” added Lim.

“We offer NOL significant benefits -- cost savings, cash flow improvements and service improvements -- through our best practices and proven management processes and tools,” said Sadeesh Raghavan, a partner with Accenture’s Freight and Logistics practice in Asia Pacific.

About NOL Group
NOL is a global transportation and logistics company engaged in shipping and related businesses. Its container transportation arm, APL, provides customers around the world with container transportation services that combine high quality inter-modal operations with state-of-the-art information technology while APL Logistics provides end to end supply chain management services through its global network. Its petroleum transportation company, American Eagle Tankers (AET) provides quality services to the oil industry, principally in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico region. Its home page is www.nol.com.sg.

About Accenture
Accenture is the world’s leading management consulting and technology services company. Committed to delivering innovation, Accenture collaborates with its clients to help them realize their visions and create tangible value. With deep industry expertise, broad global resources and proven experience in consulting and outsourcing, Accenture can mobilize the right people, skills, alliances and technologies. With more than 75,000 people in 47 countries, the company generated net revenues of $11.6 billion for the fiscal year ended August 31, 2002. Its home page is www.accenture.com.

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