Purchase, NY – July 15, 2002 – In a key development designed to give its member financial institutions and their corporate and public sector customers best-in-class access to travel and entertainment (T&E) expense reporting and reconciliation services, MasterCard International announced today that it has established automatic data feeds from its Global Data Repository in St. Louis to six leading travel expense management solution providers. The direct connections enable organizations using MasterCard commercial cards to access their employees’ transaction data anytime, anywhere, helping to auto-populate and reconcile expense reports while enhancing productivity and control over general business expenses.

By building and maintaining a direct pipeline to the travel expense management software providers, MasterCard has saved payment card issuers, corporations and public sector organizations the significant resources needed to undertake the integration themselves. MasterCard will actively support additional T&E expense management solutions based on customer needs.

"MasterCard has made significant advancements by providing the greatest degree of choice and flexibility in the T&E space for corporations and public sector organizations that use MasterCard commercial cards," said Steve L. Abrams, senior vice president, Corporate Payment Solutions, MasterCard International. "By enabling a direct data feed from MasterCard to the leading travel expense management providers, our member financial institutions will minimize the investments they need upfront in time and capital, so that they gain speed-to-market."

According to Celent Communications, a diverse market research organization, online employee expense reporting and reconciliation is gaining popularity among corporations and organizations as a means to analyze employee expenditures for enhanced savings in a tighter economy. Alenka Grealish, a senior consultant with Celent, said, "This undertaking demonstrates that MasterCard and its member banks truly understand the desires of a CFO for increased control over corporate spending coupled with a CTO’s need to focus his or her technical resources intelligently and efficiently."

"By working with these powerful technology partners, we are empowering corporations and public sector institutions with the tools to understand and control employee spend," said Philip J. Philliou, vice president, Global e-Business and Emerging Technologies, MasterCard International. "Business travel and the management of business expenses is a whole new ballgame today – CFOs will no longer tolerate being locked into a T&E card program that does not meet their corporate needs and objectives. Using leading edge technology, MasterCard commercial card programs are the platform of choice for travel, purchasing and fleet programs for corporations and public sector institutions."

One organization leveraging innovative T&E expense management solutions is General Motors Corp. "We consider automated expense management a win-win-win," said Bill Wimsatt, manager of account services in the Enterprise Activities Group of General Motors Corp., the company's shared services division. Captura and MasterCard simplify business travel procedures for employees since all charges made to their corporate card are visible in the system and they need only validate the card transaction through a point and click technique. It provides us with important financial information we can use to strengthen our leverage with suppliers in our corporate travel business."

Captura – MasterCard has aligned with Captura to deliver Internet-based expense management application services such as T&E, purchasing/procurement, fleet and telephony, tailored to meet the needs of companies worldwide. Captura Expense, which automates the total expense reporting process, is electronically capturing detailed data that was previously unavailable to financial managers and ensures uniform compliance with corporate rules and corporate card policies. Captura and MasterCard help companies identify spending trends and harness potential cost savings. MasterCard's state-of-the-art Global Data Repository facilitates the mapping of corporate card transactions to Captura's import specification.

Concur – The world’s leading provider of corporate expense management solutions, Concur Technologies enables MasterCard members to leverage Concur Expense software to streamline the T&E expense management process – from expense report preparation and approval to policy compliance, data analysis, and reimbursement. Travelers prepare expense reports faster and more accurately, aided by the direct prepopulation of expense data from their corporate charge card, purchasing card, one card and mobile devices. Expense reports are automatically routed to managers, who can more efficiently approve expense reports on-line, receive immediate notification of non-compliant entries, and ensure quick reimbursement. Easily accessible expense data allows companies to analyze spending trends and negotiate better supplier rates for additional savings. Delivering its solutions through license and Application Service Provider (ASP) models, Concur has proven deployment capability with successful implementations ranging from 50 users to 200,000 users in the private, public and government sectors.

Extensity – As a leader in financial Employee Relationship Management solutions, Extensity’s applications provide companies visibility into, and control over, employee-based financial processes such as expense reporting, travel planning, procurement and time capture. The company’s integration with MasterCard allows joint customers to closely track the entire travel and expense management process, helping to control costs and drive adoption of corporate card programs. By using the ERM-commercial card application, an employee can pre-populate an expense report automatically with each transaction. In addition, Extensity's flexible applications incorporate a company's unique set of business rules, increasing compliance with purchasing preferences and regulations. Extensity has licensed more than 1,000,000 seats worldwide. More information about Extensity is available on its web site at http://www.extensity.com

Gelco Expense Management – MasterCard’s alliance with Gelco Expense Management allows member financial institutions and their customers the ability to fully automate expense processing by combining the utility of the MasterCard Corporate Multi Card with Gelco’s leading web-based corporate and public sector expense management solutions. Through the agreement, MasterCard leverages Gelco Travel Manager and the MasterCard Public Sector Multi Card to provide public sector organizations with timely and accurate expense management information to gain increased controls. For corporate organizations the agreement links Gelco’s comprehensive outsourced expense management solution ExpenseLink with MasterCard Payment Services to gain strategic insight into spending trends, realize potential savings and enable organizations to make better financial decisions.

Necho – MasterCard’s program with Necho, a global mid-market leader in expense management automation solutions, facilitates company’s best practices for processing and controlling employee business expenses such as T&E. Its solutions enable MasterCard members to provide organizations with a complete suite of expense solutions interoperable on any technology platform anywhere in the world. In addition to automating business expenses on a MasterCard commercial card, Necho provides solutions for employee expenses including purchasing card, fleet, petty cash, employee relocations and meeting expenditures.

SPS International – MasterCard SmartLinkä * - the MISSING LINKä in Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems - is a software solution that seamlessly integrates transaction data from MasterCard commercial cards into an organization’s ERP system. MasterCard SmartLink includes a complete T&E solution that fully automates the purchase and expense process. Using SAP’s workflow, the solution enables cardholders to create travel requisitions, submit the itinerary to a travel agent, review, approve and allocate T&E transactions into the appropriate cost centers, and electronically submit and track expense reports.

Demonstrating its commitment, MasterCard International is implementing the MasterCard SmartLink T&E solution at its European headquarters in Brussels. MasterCard SmartLink recently was certified by the SAP Integration and Certification Centre in Walldorf, Germany, as an interface software to SAP software solutions. It is exclusively licensed to MasterCard International by SPS International Limited.

About MasterCard Global e-Business

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*MasterCard SmartLink is the program name in the United States only. Outside of the U.S., the program is referred to as MasterCard’s ERP Integration Program.

Contact: Alex Lau, MasterCard International
914-249-3095, alex_lau@mastercard.com

Adam Christensen, Brodeur Worldwide for MasterCard International
203-399-8280, achristensen@brodeur.com