March 15, 2000. San Jose, CA.

ACI Acquires StarNine Technologies, Inc.

ACI SA, ACI US’ parent company and publishers of the 4th Dimension
RAD/RDBMS Environment, announced today that they have acquired StarNine
Technologies Inc., makers of WebSTAR Server Suite, from Platinum Equity
Holdings.

StarNine has been a leader in the development of Internet server software,
content creation tools and email connectivity products for the Mac OS. They
have been awarded numerous honors for their WebSTAR Web server software
which is considered a de facto standard within the industry.

ACI has been delivering desktop relational databases management systems
(RDBMS) to developers since 1984. In 1997, with the release of 4th
Dimension version 6.0 (4Dv6.0), ACI began focusing on bringing its RDBMS
environment to the web development market.

Both ACI and StarNine are serious about the web development market and the
combined resources between the two companies of people and technology will
benefit both the products and the Mac OS customers who use these products.

“StarNine is a strong, financially solid company with excellent products
and a bright future,” said Tom Gores, Platinum Equity Holdings president
and CEO. “The potential of teaming it with ACI, a company with an equally
strong upside and products and services, will position StarNine and its
employees for tremendous future growth and success.”

“ACI is a mature company whose longevity will provide a strong foundation
for advancing the WebSTAR Server Suite,” said Scott Steward, President,
StarNine, Technologies, Inc.

“The acquisition of StarNine provides ACI with a tremendous resource of
technology and people,” said Laurent Ribardiere, president, ACI SA, Inc.
“The engineering and support teams have created a powerful web application
that complements the 4D line of products wonderfully.”

For more information regarding the acquisition please visit the ACI US home
page at: http://www.acius.com.

About ACI US

ACI US, Inc. is the US publisher of 4th Dimension and the 4D family of
products, which has set the relational database standard for over fifteen
years. ACI publishes a tightly integrated suite of professional,
cross-platform web-imbedded development tools.
ACI US, Inc. Tel 800-881-3466
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San Jose, CA 95128 Fax 408-557-4660
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