Lockheed Martin today announced the French Post Office, La Poste, has agreed to invest $175 million in its future mail processing information system. Lockheed Martin is partnering with Bull on the Systeme d'Interpretation des Adresses (SIA) initiative, which will provide automation solutions that will improve the efficiency and accuracy of France's postal system.

"We are extremely pleased to work with Bull to develop innovative solutions for La Poste," said Brian Tanton, vice president and general manager of Lockheed Martin's Distribution Technologies business. "Lockheed Martin's address recognition capabilities have been proven worldwide, where we provide postal authorities the most advanced technologies available to process and deliver mail."

Lockheed Martin is a leading provider of address recognition technology and mail automation solutions worldwide. The company's Address Interpretation technology includes image capture systems, information networking, as well as advanced recognition software.

Bull's postal business unit delivers turnkey mail automation systems in Europe. Bull will provide program management, IT equipment, operational rollout, and on-line support of mission critical projects to integrate and deploy solutions for mail automation and parcel sortation. These solutions will enable the introduction of new postal billable services and help optimize overall operational cost.

"Bull is pleased to play a prominent role in the reengineering of postal services after the European deregulation," said Yves Veret, managing director of Bull's Defense and Emerging Markets. "We are looking forward to combining our capability with Lockheed Martin's postal service expertise to offer La Poste a leading edge solution to SIA."

Headquartered in Bethesda, Md., Lockheed Martin employs about 135,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services.

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http://www.lockheedmartin.com/

SOURCE: Lockheed Martin