BURLINGTON, Mass., July 20, 2004 -- Esselte, the leading global manufacturer of office supplies, has standardized on an enterprise business intelligence (EBI) solution from Cognos (Nasdaq: COGN; TSX: CSN), the world leader in business intelligence and corporate performance management.

Esselte has established a BI Center of Excellence in Europe, which will spearhead all BI projects throughout the global offices. Executives, managers and business analysts will leverage the Cognos solution to track and measure key performance metrics, analyze sales, marketing and supply chain information, and develop and share critical business and operational reports.

"Standardizing on Cognos as a common BI solution will help Esselte to lower the overall cost of ownership by reducing the number of BI solutions we need to manage and maintain," said Mark Katz, vice president, Worldwide Information Technology, Esselte. "This solution will provide us with better visibility and more consistent understanding and analysis of customer sales and supply chain movements."

"Another important requirement for a standard business intelligence was flexibility," said Paul Vandenhende, director of business intelligence, Esselte. "We required a common platform that would be flexible enough to supports users with different needs and different levels of sophistication. Also, performance and 24/7 availability were essential requirements for a rapidly growing user community."

"Large distributed companies like Esselte are seeing the value and competitive advantage offered by standardizing on a single business intelligence vendor that can meet and exceed expectations in all aspects of corporate performance management," said Paul Hoy, director of manufacturing solutions, Cognos. "Esselte is a leader in their field and has driven innovative solutions across the company to improve performance and support a strategic decision-making culture."

About Esselte:

Esselte, headquartered in Stamford, Conn., USA, is the leading global office supplies manufacturer with annual sales of approximately USD 1.2 billion, subsidiaries in 26 countries and 5,900 employees worldwide. The company develops innovative solutions that simplify the modern home and workplace. Esselte sells more than 30,000 different office products in over 120 countries; its principal brands include DYMO, Esselte, Leitz, Oxford, Pendaflex and Xyron. Esselte was founded in 1913 as SLT (Sveriges Litografiska Tryckerier) after the union of 13 Swedish graphics related companies. More information about Esselte can be found by visiting http://www.esselte.com

About Cognos:

Cognos, the world leader in enterprise business intelligence and corporate performance management, delivers software that helps companies drive, monitor and understand corporate performance.

Cognos delivers the next level of competitive advantage - Corporate Performance Management (CPM) - achieved through the strategic application of BI on an enterprise scale. Our integrated CPM solution helps customers drive performance through planning; monitor performance through scorecarding; and understand performance through business intelligence.

Cognos serves more than 22,000 customers in over 135 countries. Cognos enterprise business intelligence and performance management solutions and services are also available from more than 3,000 worldwide partners and resellers. For more information, visit the Cognos Web site at http://www.cognos.com.

Cognos and the Cognos logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Cognos Incorporated in the United States and/or other countries. All other names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

Note to Editors: Copies of previous Cognos press releases and Corporate and product information are available on the Cognos Web site at http://www.cognos.com and at PR Newswire's site at http://www.prnewswire.com.

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