NEWS & EVENTS

Exton, PA – December 1, 2003 – With both the Food & Drug Administration and the
U.S. Department of Agriculture poised to announce new requirements for food safety and bioterrorism, food manufacturers have an urgent need to automate their compliance and increase the accuracy of their collected data.

Recently, Advanced Automation Associates, Inc. (A3) has been working with a top
national food manufacturer to automate their hazard analysis and critical control point (HAACP) compliance. The team of engineers at A3 has created a unique, hand-held PC barcode scanner that provides an “alarm” function to make sure that operators are
doing HACCP checks on time and with full accuracy.

ScanHACCP, a combination of hardware and software, provides statistical process
control to determine if temperatures are out of spec and guides the operator through appropriate adjustments. Most importantly, in regards to the FDA’s Bioterrorism Act, it enables the manufacturer to track specific lots of ingredients through their entire
plant, from check-in through to the retail delivery.

“The Public Health Security and Bioterrorism Preparedness and Response Act of
2002 gave the FDA new authority to protect the nation’s food supply,” said Robert A. Zeigenfuse, the founder, President and Chief Executive Officer of A3. “They have been tuning and tweaking this over the past 18 months, and in December, they will be issuing the
final guidelines. Our client has moved ahead of the curve by working with Advanced Automation Associates to develop an ideal solution for their manufacturing plants, and provide detailed and reliable data in compliance with the FDA’s new requirements.”

Advanced Automation Associates

Advanced Automation Associates (A3) is a manufacturing solutions company that
helps our clients to solve manufacturing process challenges, automate system control processes, and to integrate supervisory and data management systems to the corporate enterprise. A3 has deep experience in the pharmaceutical, food, beverage, and the commercial printing industries worldwide and is the largest independent controls systems integrator in the world. A3 and has been the industry leader in establishing process control and manufacturing automation standards since 1984. Additional information about the company is available on their web site at http://www.advancedautomation.com.

Media Contact:
Amanda Cook
Phone: 610-458-8700
E-mail: acook@aaainc.com