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GEMBA RESEARCH SELECTS IGRAFX® SOLUTIONS AS STANDARD FOR VALUE STREAM MAPPING TRAINING

Company Joins iGrafx Partner Program to Gain Additional Benefits

Tualatin , Ore . - January 11, 2005 - iGrafx®, a leading provider of Business Process Analysis (BPA) solutions, announced that Gemba Research has selected iGrafx® FlowCharterT 2005 as a standard component of its Value Stream Mapping (VSM) training and consulting programs. Gemba will also resell iGrafx® ProcessT for Six Sigma, the leading process analysis solution for Six Sigma.

Gemba Research is a consulting firm that specializes in helping organizations in a wide range of industries apply the concepts of Lean Enterprise Transformation and Kaizen (continuous improvement). Gemba's approach is to identify and map key Value Streams and drive improvement through training and team-based Kaizen activity. Gemba's clients include many leading manufacturers including Firestone, Toro, Barnes Aerospace, Textron and many other companies in diverse industries.

Lean practices such as value stream mapping have become an important tool in the arsenal of many leading manufacturing companies and has proven itself to be a powerful tool in helping companies adapt to the demands of the rapid economy. Lean manufacturing techniques have been successfully applied by leading companies in all types of industries. From its origins in Japan's automotive manufacturing sector, the lean methodology has been a significant contributor to helping companies reduce lead times, eliminate waste, reduce inventories, improve quality, increase capacity in existing facilities, reduce total cost and deliver increased value to customers.

"Our clients have asked us for a long time for a way to accurately and quickly document 'pen and paper' Value Stream Mapping activity in a digital format. As powerful as it can be to map existing business processes in manufacturing or administrative environments, improvement teams were burdened by documenting, sharing, and preserving the "wall paper" maps." Said Jon Miller, President of Gemba Research. "We have found the solution with iGrafx. We are very excited by iGrafx products' capabilities to enhance our training and consulting activities. By integrating these solutions into what we do, our clients will be able to deploy and document their Lean Transformation more rapidly."

Using iGrafx, Gemba's clients will have the ability to easily develop diagrams regularly used by Lean practitioners including value stream maps, SIPOC diagrams, layout diagrams and pick charts all within a single tool. Additionally, the value stream maps contain unique analysis capabilities that automatically calculate critical Lean metrics such as Takt Time, Lead Time, VA Time and Efficiency as well as automatically generating Timelines and Line Balancing charts.

"Documenting what is, designing what should be, and communicating the new process design is a critical part of Lean methodology and iGrafx provides Gemba Research with a unique, high quality solution for their clients," said Ken Carraher , president, iGrafx. "Gemba Research has proven its commitment and leadership in the Lean environment. By integrating iGrafx solutions into its training offerings, Gemba Research continues to give its students and customers industry-leading Lean training and consulting combined with leading edge technology solutions."  

About Gemba Research

Gemba Research is a consulting firm specializing in training and implementation of Lean principles based on the Toyota Production System. In addition to on-site training and consulting Gemba offers public training seminars at Lean Learning Lab facility on a regular basis. Gemba also takes clients on study missions to Japan to see and learn from the world class Lean firms on their Japan Kaikaku Experience. Gemba also develops, publishes training materials and resells books and software its Kaizen Products business unit. Visit www.gemba.com

About iGrafx

iGrafx provides a comprehensive family of business process analysis tools that help organizations understand, analyze, and optimize their processes for key corporate initiatives including Six Sigma, Lean, Business Process Management (BPM), ISO and Sarbanes-Oxley. iGrafx solutions create a team-based collaborative process visualization and analysis environment that enables companies to achieve and sustain process excellence while increasing their return on investment. The iGrafx process management solution assists in reducing costs, increasing resource utilization, and determining how best to allocate and deploy resources. iGrafx is a division of Corel Corporation. 

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