NSTAR Powers Operational Efficiency with Data Integration Solutions from Ascential Software

NSTAR Powers Operational Efficiency with Data Integration
Solutions from Ascential Software
Ascential QualityStage and Ascential DataStage Help Energy Delivery Company
Improve Business Performance 


WESTBORO, Mass., Dec. 13  /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Ascential Software
Corporation (NASDAQ:ASCL), the enterprise data integration leader, today
announced that NSTAR (NYSE:NST), Massachusetts' largest investor-owned electric
and gas utility, is using Ascential Software enterprise data integration
solutions for projects involving customer and geographic data quality and an
enterprise data warehouse. These IT initiatives have helped NSTAR improve
customer satisfaction levels by generating rapid service outage analyses. In
turn, NSTAR can provide timely outage information to customers. NSTAR is an
energy delivery company primarily engaged in the transmission and distribution
of energy. The company serves approximately 1.4 million customers in
Massachusetts, including approximately 1.1 million electricity customers in 81
communities and 300,000 gas customers in 51 communities.

Ascential QualityStage(TM) is the foundation of NSTAR's data quality management
infrastructure. With Ascential QualityStage, customer location information is
transformed into reference data for dispatchers to analyze when addressing
service outages. Dispatchers use this transformed data to view customer calls
on a graphical overlay of NSTAR's distribution network, and provide customers
with more information on where the problem is occurring and how long it will
take to restore power in the affected areas.

NSTAR uses Ascential DataStage(TM) to transform data and build its enterprise
data warehouse to support the information needs of the entire company. This
includes standardizing customer address information and generating data metrics
for executive analysis. By leveraging the Ascential Software solution, the
company maintains accuracy, consistency and trust in its data across the
organization, so business decisions are made in confidence.

"Reliability and cost are the most important factors when it comes to meeting
the needs of our customers," said Mannie Goldberg, director, Data Resource
Management, NSTAR.  "With the Ascential Software data integration solution, we
have succeeded in faster identification of outage areas, helping decrease
operational costs and increase customer satisfaction."

"Consolidation and globalization in the utilities industry drive companies such
as NSTAR to continue to improve information sharing and establish reliable data
processes," said Thracy Varvoglis, executive director of industry solutions at
Ascential Software. "By partnering with Ascential Software, NSTAR has developed
a repeatable data quality process that will be realized across the
organization."

Ascential QualityStage, a core component of Ascential Enterprise Integration
Suite(TM), provides a powerful framework for developing and deploying data
investigation, standardization, enrichment, probabilistic matching and
survivorship operations. For use in transactional, operational, or analytic
applications, in batch and real-time, the same services are seamlessly deployed
to facilitate data validation, cleansing or master data entity consolidation
for customers, locations and products.

Ascential DataStage, another component of Ascential Enterprise Integration
Suite, enables companies to tightly integrate enterprise information,
regardless of the sources, targets and timeframes. Whether an organization is
building an enterprise data warehouse to support the information needs of the
entire company, building a "real-time" data warehouse, or integrating multiple
source systems to support strategic business systems such as CRM, SCM, ERP,
BI/analytics and e-business, Ascential DataStage helps enable the success of
enterprise data integration initiatives.

About NSTAR

As Massachusetts' largest investor-owned electric and gas utility, NSTAR has
been transmitting and delivering electricity and natural gas for more than 100
years. We serve nearly 1.4 million residential and business customers in over
100 Eastern Massachusetts communities. NSTAR's regulated subsidiaries have more
than 3,200 employees. NSTAR transmits and delivers electricity to more than one
million customers in the City of Boston, and 80 other communities in Eastern
and Central Massachusetts. NSTAR also delivers natural gas to more than 300,000
homes in 51 communities. For more information about NSTAR visit
http://www.nstaronline.com/.

About Ascential Software

Ascential Software Corporation (NASDAQ:ASCL) is the leader in enterprise data
integration.  Customers and partners worldwide use the Ascential Enterprise
Integration Suite to confidently transform data into accurate, reliable and
complete business information to improve operational performance and
decision-making across every critical business dimension.  Our comprehensive
end-to-end solutions provide on demand data integration complemented by our
professional services, industry expertise, and methodologies.

Ascential Software is headquartered in Westboro, Mass., and has more than 3,000
customers and partners globally across such industries as financial services
and banking, insurance, healthcare, retail, manufacturing, consumer packaged
goods, telecommunications and government.  For more information call
1-800-966-9875 (508-366.3888 if calling from outside the US or Canada) or visit
the Ascential Software website at http://www.ascential.com/.

Safe Harbor Statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of
1995: This release contains forward-looking statements based on current
expectations or beliefs, as well as a number of assumptions about future
events, and these statements are subject to important factors and uncertainties
that could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in
the forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements in this release
address a variety of subjects including, for example, the functionality,
characteristics, quality and performance capabilities of Ascential Software's
products and technology; results achievable and benefits attainable through
deployment of Ascential Software's products and provision of services; and
improvements in operational performance and decision-making, the ability of
Ascential Software's products to provide a powerful framework for developing
and deploying data investigation, standardization, enrichment, probabilistic
matching and survivorship operations; the ability of Ascential Software's
products to facilitate data validation, cleansing or master data entity
consolidation for customers, locations and products and the ability of
Ascential Software's products to integrate enterprise information, regardless
of the sources, targets and timeframes.  The following factors, among others,
could cause actual results to differ materially from those described in these
forward-looking statements: the ability of the company to expand its market
share; growth rates for the enterprise data integration software market;
general business conditions in the software industry, the technology sector,
and in the domestic and international economies; rapid technological change in
the markets served by the company; dependence on international operations;
global and geopolitical instability; compliance costs associated with
regulations to which the company is subject, including the Sarbanes-Oxley Act
of 2002, and the impact of such regulations; and difficulties that the company
may experience integrating technologies, operations and personnel of completed
or future acquisitions. For a detailed discussion of these and other cautionary
statements, please refer to the filings made by Ascential Software with the
Securities and Exchange Commission, including, without limitation, the most
recent Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q. Ascential Software disclaims any intent
or obligation to update any forward-looking statements made herein to reflect
any change in Ascential Software's expectations with regard thereto or any
change in events, conditions, or circumstances on which such statements are
based.  Ascential Software is not responsible for statements attributed to
third parties within this release or in any materials referenced herein.
Partnerships described herein shall be deemed to be strategic alliances only,
and shall not imply the power of either partner to bind the other partner or to
incur obligations on behalf of the other partner.

All rights reserved. Ascential, Ascential DataStage, Ascential QualityStage and
Ascential Enterprise Integration Suite are trademarks of Ascential Software
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DATASOURCE: Ascential Software Corporation



CONTACT: Chas Kielt of Ascential Software Corporation, [phone],

; or Mary Keith of Porter Novelli, [phone],





Web site:  http://www.ascentialsoftware.com/

http://www.nstaronline.com/ 

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