Chemove Introduces First Independent Internet-Based Logistics Market Place for the Chemicals Industry

London (30 May, 2000) - Chemove (www.chemove.com) today announced plans to create a competitive and transparent Internet-based logistics market place for the chemicals and plastics industries. Its founders, Dr Mark Betts and Chris Badenhorst, describe Chemove as the first neutral B2B chemical and petrochemical logistics marketplace. It was founded in February 2000. The venture has backing from Morgan Grenfell Private Equity, the private equity arm of Deutsche Bank, and has to date been supported in its strategy and business development by one of the world's leading Internet professional services company - marchFIRST. marchFIRST recently was responsible for launching Covalex in the USA.

Producers will be able to procure their logistics service requirements such as shipping, transport (road, rail, intermodal), storage, and other services on-line. Similarly, logistics service providers will be able to offer logistics services on-line, leading to greater transparency and efficiency for both buyers and sellers of logistics. The net result will be a reduction in the total cost of logistics to the industry through better utilisation of the available infrastructure.

According to the founders: "The product and service offering is clearly defined, and different from offerings and intentions announced by other players which have recently begun to emerge in this space. Chemove offers real advantages and efficiencies that a true marketplace will bring, to all players including external interest groups and associations within the petrochemical and chemical industry. One of our key strengths is that our model is very straightforward and easy to adopt and use at all levels across large and small organizations. This is because utilizing Chemove's platform will have a minimum, or no disruption, on existing internal processes within organizations that choose to use it. The service offering can then be built up according to the user/s individual and or corporate requirements."

Chemove will both compliment and be a tool for vertical marketplaces in this sector.

"We have found that true neutrality as well as the Chemove concept has been opening numerous doors at a high level across the industry. On testing our model, and demonstrating the functionality, we have also found very encouraging responses from personnel that are responsible for logistics procurement as well as logistics sales - across a wide range of organizations".

Chemove's approach, to date, has been somewhat different from that of other players in the chemical e-commerce space. " We have not been actively marketing Chemove before our service offering and product architecture was more clearly defined, but have rather been working closely with, and obtaining insights into processes from a selected spectrum of industry players. The result of this is that there now is a clearly defined and coded phase 1-demonstration product. Our plan is to continue working closely with our Charter members and clients in a piloting and development phase before formally launching Chemove."