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Latest KSS PriceNet software supports volume and profit growth strategies

Version 5 will help fuels retailers address challenging trading conditions by increasing pricing agility and seeking out new volume/margin opportunities

Florham Park, NJ – January 29th, 2009 – In response to the recent dramatic changes in global fuels markets, economic conditions and their impact on customer demand for fuel, KSS has significantly enhanced its core PriceNet system with the release of version 5.0.

The new release focuses on support for volume and/or profit growth strategies, pricing process agility (to cope with cost/price volatility), improved compliance monitoring, and capabilities for dealing with rapidly changing customer demand. The update also includes a major architectural upgrade to the latest Microsoft .NET standards, to deliver greater speed and to allow customers to benefit from hardware rationalization initiatives that support multiple installations on one server and server virtualization, clusters and web farms.

PriceNet version 5.0 includes enhancements in the following areas:

Performance optimization – the ability to optimize prices to grow volume subject to a cash profit goal, in addition to the existing optimization aimed at growing profit for given volume plans. This will enable fuel retailers to identify and grasp opportunities to increase volume market-share at site level.

Demand forecasting & strategy modeling – ability to forecast volume by site and grade over longer periods and quantitative analysis of where current strategy may be restricting opportunities for volume or margin growth.

Price auditing & compliance – step-by-step trace of how prices are derived and auditable log of any policy/strategy changes to enhance price compliance monitoring and reporting.

Event pricing flexibility – ability to schedule alternate pricing strategies / scenarios where events affect fuel demand or margin performance. Within Event pricing, event planning can be set as a one-time activity or a re-occurring activity for set time periods to meet various market demands. Events can be set at single stores or distributed across multiple stores.

User experience – new screens with user-level configuration, wizards to guide users more quickly through key activities, dynamic page layouts and the ability to contact KSS support directly from the main pricing screen and send all relevant data to facilitate quicker responses.

PriceNet 5.0 is generally available beginning the middle of February.

“The PriceNet 5.0 release is a major upgrade and a significant step forward for fuels retailers in all industry sectors. We have combined feedback from our customers with investigation into the most pressing business issues in today’s fuel retailing markets to deliver a comprehensive and highly configurable pricing platform,” commented Bob Stein, president and chief executive officer of KSS. “The improvements to our pricing science, specifically optimization, will help fuel retailers preserve market share, generate additional cash and react more rapidly to customer demand shifts. We are very confident that customers and prospects will derive significant value-add from this latest version.”

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