MKS Announces Partnership with SCM Consulting Firm - AFORA International

AFORA's international SCM expertise complements MKS Integrity Solution and drives enhanced customer return on investment

Waterloo, ON - September 10, 2002: MKS Inc. (MKS) (TSE:MKX), a leading provider of tools to manage and control the software development process, today announced a consulting partnership with AFORA International, a recognized leader in Software Configuration Management (SCM) technology and methods with offices located in Eindhoven, Paris, London, Cologne and Boston.

AFORA consultants, in cooperation with the world's most respected SCM tool providers, have been improving the process and tool implementations of both large and small organizations for well over a decade. AFORA consultants provide process support, and implementation and training, in the geographically distributed, multi-platform, multi-tool environments of today. AFORA offers MKS enterprise customers a deep knowledge of SCM assessment, process definition and automation, as well as quality initiatives and methodologies including CMM, ISO and ITIL. These are delivered through on site rapid-return consulting engagements aimed at lowering total cost of ownership while improving ROI on SCM tool investments.

MKS and AFORA are actively engaged with several Global 1000 customers in the United Kingdom, Europe and North America and are currently planning further joint marketing and sales activities.

"MKS and AFORA share a mutual philosophy toward software process improvement. We believe in approaching software process improvement simply, with focus on the real goals of the organization: developing product that will improve the organization's bottom line. We do not tear down the existing process, we begin with it - because it is what people know and understand, and then we work with the organization to make the process solid and reliable, while keeping it simple," says Cees Loppersum, Managing Director, AFORA International. "Using MKS Integrity Manager™, we can then easily map process to the tool, and drive down costs through automation."

"AFORA has a very pragmatic vision for process improvement that is in line with MKS's own goals, and that is to enable enterprise development organizations to work better, faster, and cheaper," says David Martin, MKS vice president, Product Management. "Our goal is to provide our customers with a more effective SCM solution that is tuned to their business needs. AFORA's extensive experience, insight, and significant customer relationships in the financial services market where we continue to excel, bode well for our ongoing success in making certain our customers get the most out of our MKS Integrity Solution™."

About MKS
MKS Inc. ("MKS") (TSE:MKX) provides software solutions enabling development teams to analyze, build and deploy traditional and web-based software systems quickly and reliably. The company's award-winning family of MKS Integrity software configuration management (SCM) products, offer advanced technology with robust workflow, code management, and impact analysis capabilities. MKS also provides interoperability solutions under its popular MKS Toolkit brand for UNIX-Windows co-existence, cross-platform development, and system administration that significantly cut development and administrative costs and reduce time to market while enabling enhanced performance. Founded in 1984 with over 10,000 customers worldwide, MKS has built its brand on the foundation of advanced technology, superior quality and extraordinary customer service. More information about MKS can be found at http://www.mks.com, or by calling 1-800-265-2797 (US & Canada), +49-711-351775-0 (Germany), and +44-1483-733900 (United Kingdom).

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