e-Spirit Expands Presence in Benelux

London, United Kingdom, November 12, 2009 --(PR.com)-- With the addition of the food service company Deli XL (www.delixl.nl), which provides a full range of food products for large kitchens, e-Spirit (www.e-Spirit.com) has acquired its first customer in the Netherlands. At the same time, the maker of the Content Management System FirstSpirit is also expanding its partner network in the Benelux. With Colours (www.colours.nl) and Unic B.V. (www.unic.com), e-Spirit is expanding its network with two additional Dutch specialists for e-business solutions.

FirstSpirit stands out through usability
Deli XL, which employs approximately 2,000 people at 18 locations in the Netherlands, will completely redesign its website for much greater interactivity using FirstSpirit as a basis. The company will be assisted in the project by the new e-Spirit partner, Colours, who won the project for e-Spirit and are responsible for the complete project management. User-friendliness was one of the key factors in the decision to choose FirstSpirit. One of the areas where FirstSpirit shined, for example, was with its media management capability: Editors are not required to create and upload graphics one by one, but instead can transfer entire folders to the media store using drag and drop. This saves valuable time, particularly with media-intensive websites such as Deli XL's. As Martin van Dam, director of marketing and e-commerce at Deli XL, explains: "Basically there were two main goals we wanted to achieve with our site relaunch: On the one hand, we needed our site to be a leading service portal, but at the same time we also wanted to make sure our customers had a quality experience when they visit the site." In addition, in the future every user will create their own homepage and will then be able to display only the content they're interested in. The system will remember the configuration for each individualized homepage and display it exactly the same way on the next visit. Future plans also call for a dynamic recipe database which displays matching recipes and wine suggestions for real-time selection, and also provides a convenient search feature.

Colours and Unic as new partners
The new e-Spirit partner Colours is developing interactive websites, and is providing Internet specialists to support it, for a broad spectrum of companies, including FrieslandCampina, Daimler, the Dutch Red Cross, and InterRail. Colours provides comprehensive support to its customers in strategy & design, e-commerce, technical development, and support. Paul Hinze, managing director at Colours, said of the partnership: "We're seeing increasing demand from our customers for high-end content management systems. So we're pleased to have e-Spirit as a partner with a leading Content Management solution that meets the most sophisticated requirements. The fact that FirstSpirit is based on Java technology and is thus compatible with e-commerce platforms such as Hybris – even looking at our customer requests – presents us with various attractive options. Winning Deli XL and starting project work straight away is the ideal kick-off for a promising cooperation with e-Spirit."

The IT provider Unic Benelux develops and supports efficient e-business- and Enterprise Content Management solutions for various notable companies such as Coca-Cola, Bobcat Hewlett-Packard, and Credit Suisse. According to Michel da Silva, CEO of Unic Benelux: "The partnership of e-Spirit and Unic offers our customers a top-flight content management solution. With FirstSpirit we're expanding our offerings with a high-performance product in the high-end segment."

After launching the partnership with TopForce in September, e-Spirit has continued to steadily increase its presence in the three neighboring countries. "The acquisition of Deli XL as a new customer in our view confirms the fact that entering the Benelux market through strategic partners is the right way to go," says Jörn Bodemann, CEO of e-Spirit. "With their extensive web- and project know-how, along with their solid contacts in the industry, Unic and Colours are ideal partners for our CMS FirstSpirit."

Download the press release and graphic materials at www.e-Spirit.com/news.

About e-Spirit AG and FirstSpirit™
As the manufacturer of the high-end Content Management Systems FirstSpirit™, e-Spirit AG is a technology leader in the European market. The company was founded in 1999 by former members of Fraunhofer ISST in collaboration with the IT service provider adesso. In addition to the licensing business and the FirstSpirit™ integration, e-Spirit AG also provides comprehensive support for complex Internet and intranet projects. Customers also benefit from the expertise of partner firms in consultation and implementation.

FirstSpirit™ is a high-end solution for Enterprise Content Management (ECM) and for integration with complex system environments and portals. Sophisticated customers use the Content Management System (CMS) to publish a full range of content over virtually any available channel (Internet, intranet, and extranet, PDF, email newsletter, portals, DTP, technical documentation). Users expect a high level of usability, performance, integration capability, and investment security. In addition to comprehensive out-of-the-box functionalities, e-Spirit also integrates innovative solutions from its technology partners into the basic modular structure of FirstSpirit™.

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