HACKENSACK, New Jersey,
September 15, 2010
/PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Ness Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: NSTC and
TASE: NSTC), a global provider of IT services and solutions,
announced today that it has been awarded a contract by Israel's Meitav Regional Water and Sewage
Corporation Ltd. to provide development, improvement and
maintenance services for the company's SAP-based enterprise
resource planning (ERP) and billing system. The 5-year engagement
is valued at NIS 14.1 million, or
approximately $3.7 million. The
contract also includes an optional 3-year extension, valued at an
additional NIS 8.5 million, or
approximately $2.2 million.
Meitav provides water and sewage services to 90,000 households,
businesses and public institutions in the towns of Petach Tikva
(the sixth largest city in Israel), El'ad and Kafr Bara, east of
Tel Aviv. Meitav serves
approximately 250,000 inhabitants in total.
The system, called Meitavit, is an end-to-end water and sewage
services management system. Meitavit includes various SAP-based
components including financial, logistics, procurement, inventory,
control, billing and collections, customer relationship management
(CRM), project management and human resources. In addition,
Meitavit includes a content management component, based on EMC
Documentum, which is distributed in Israel by NessPRO, Ness' software products
group. Meitavit completely integrates the various processes,
presenting a unified situation picture to decision makers. The
billing and collection component uploads water meter readings
transmitted remotely from the meters across the city.
"Meitav works constantly to improve its information systems,"
said Hanoch Milo, chief executive
officer of Meitav. "The end result of the implementation of these
advanced systems is the maintenance of a high quality,
professional, reliable customer service system; an improved and
expanded support system for conducting broad infrastructure work;
and supporting the system of current water tests. We are pleased
about Ness' winning the tender to maintain and support the Meitavit
system. The company is well known for its extensive expertise with
SAP systems, and its vast experience with municipal billing and
collection processes. We believe that Ness will help us improve our
various processes, increase our efficiency and maintain Meitav's
high-quality technological level."
"This new deal with Meitav is another milestone in our efforts
to lead the municipal and utilities IT services sector," said
Effi Kotek, president of Ness
Israel. "Recent engagements in Israel include an SAP-based billing and
collection system for the Tel Aviv Municipality, an SAP-based
maintenance management system for Mekorot, Israel's national water company, and an SAP
system deployment at the Israel Electric Company. Similar
engagements in Europe include
system implementations and development for numerous electrical
power generation and transmission companies, national and municipal
land registry and land mapping departments, among others."
About Ness Technologies
Ness Technologies (NASDAQ: NSTC and TASE: NSTC) is a global
provider of IT and business services and solutions with specialized
expertise in software product engineering; and system integration,
application development, consulting and software distribution. Ness
delivers its portfolio of solutions and services using a global
delivery model combining offshore, near-shore and local teams. With
about 7,800 employees, Ness has operations in North America, Europe, Israel and India, has customers in over 20 countries, and
partners with numerous software and hardware vendors worldwide. For
more information about Ness, visit http://www.ness.com.
About Meitav
Meitav provides water and sewage services to 90,000 households,
businesses and public institutions in the towns of Petach Tikva,
El'ad and Kafr Bara, Israel.
Overall, Meitav serves approximately 250,000 inhabitants. The
corporation was founded in January
2004 according to the Water and Sewage Corporations Law
5761-2001. In addition to its responsibility for the current supply
of water to residents, the corporation also handles developing and
upgrading the water and sewage infrastructure, and current testing
of water quality. Meitav is considered the flagship of Israel's corporate water and sewage market.
Technological improvements in information systems, alongside a
stringent enforcement and collection system, as well as broad
investments in the water and sewage infrastructure, have given it a
fine reputation in the industry. Since its establishment, the
corporation has invested approximately quarter of a billion shekels
in improving the water and sewage infrastructure, which is now 10
times bigger than it was in the period before Meitav was founded.
Thanks to improved technologies and infrastructure, water loss is
kept to a minimum: less than 4%. The collection rate is
approximately 97%. Brigadier General (res.) Hanoch Milo is the corporation's CEO.
Forward Looking Statement
This press release contains forward-looking statements within
the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of
1995. Forward-looking statements often are preceded by words such
as "believes," "expects," "may," "anticipates," "plans," "intends,"
"assumes," "will" or similar expressions. Forward-looking
statements reflect management's current expectations, as of the
date of this press release, and involve certain risks and
uncertainties. Ness' actual results could differ materially from
those anticipated in these forward looking statements as a result
of various factors. Some of the factors that could cause future
results to materially differ from the recent results or those
projected in forward-looking statements include the "Risk Factors"
described in Ness' Annual Report of Form 10-K filed with the
Securities and Exchange Commission on March
15, 2010. Ness is under no obligation, and expressly
disclaims any obligation, to update or alter its forward-looking
statements, whether as a result of such changes, new information,
subsequent events or otherwise.
Media Contact:
David Kanaan
Intl: +972-54-425-5307
Email: media.int@ness.com
Investor Relations Contact:
Drew Wright
USA: +1-201-488-3262
Email: investor@ness.com
SOURCE Ness Technologies Inc