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Exhibit 99.1
LERNOUT & HAUSPIE ANNOUNCES MANAGEMENT CHANGE
BURLINGTON, MASS. & IEPER, BELGIUM - AUGUST 25, 2000 - Lernout & Hauspie,
(Nasdaq: LHSP, Easdaq: LHSP) (L&H(TM)), a worldwide market leader in speech and
language technologies has announced that John Duerden, currently the President
and CEO of L&H's Health Care Solutions Group, has been named President and Chief
Executive Officer. John was formerly the Chairman and CEO of Dictaphone
Corporation.
John Duerden replaces Gaston Bastiaens who has decided to step aside as
President and Chief Executive Officer but will continue to play an active role
as a board member. Bastiaens is credited with leading the company through an
important phase in L&H's growth and development.
"By acquiring Dictaphone and Dragon Systems L&H gained access to a talented pool
of managers," said Gaston Bastiaens. "As a significant shareholder of L&H, I'm
very pleased with the appointment of John Duerden as my successor. With an
established track record in leading companies in bold strategic directions, John
is well-suited to take L&H into its next phase."
The announced leadership change follows the very strong growth of the company
including the acquisitions of Dragon Systems and Dictaphone earlier this year.
Under John Duerden's leadership, the company will continue the consolidation of
the human, marketing and technological resources of these companies into a
unified corporate strategy and culture and capture the synergies inherent in the
consolidation of these three companies.
As chairman and CEO of Dictaphone, acquired by L&H in May, Duerden spearheaded
the transformation of the company from a traditional hardware manufacturer into
a software-based leader in digital voice-driven network and Internet solutions.
This repositioning enabled a ten-fold increase in operating profits at
Dictaphone between 1998 and 1999.
"John's strong management and leadership reshaped Dictaphone and converted the
company into a 21st century leading-edge technology company," said Jo Lernout,
co-founder and co-chairman of Lernout & Hauspie. "We are confident that he will
bring the leadership to help us continue our successful vision."
Duerden previously served as President and Chief Operations Officer at sports
shoe company Reebok. Joining the company in 1988, he dramatically built the
company's international markets, growing business in Europe and Asia from $150
million to $1.5 billion in just five years. In addition, Duerden was part of the
Xerox management team that helped the company transition into new digital
document processing technologies.
"I share the enthusiasm and vision of Jo and Pol for the extraordinary
possibilities of our core technologies, our worldwide presence, and our
strategic partnerships," said Duerden. "I believe that the combined strength of
L&H, Dragon Systems and Dictaphone can create an exciting platform for new
speech and language technologies, products and services," he added.
In addition to his leadership as President and CEO, Duerden will serve on the
company's Executive Committee, along with company founders Jo Lernout and Pol
Hauspie, and Messrs. Nico Willaert, L&H's vice-chairman, and Roel Pieper, vice-
chairman of L&H and also vice-chairman of Computer Associates.
"During the last four years, Gaston has made our company the undisputed leader
in speech and language technologies and solutions," said Pol Hauspie, co-founder
and co-chairman of the Board. "We thank him for his unflagging dedication to the
company."
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ABOUT LERNOUT & HAUSPIE
Lernout & Hauspie (L&H) is a global leader in advanced speech and language
solutions for vertical markets, computers, automobiles, telecommunications,
embedded products, consumer goods and the Internet. The company makes the speech
user interface (SUI) the keystone of simple, convenient interaction between
humans and technology, and uses advanced translation technology to break down
language barriers. The company provides a wide range of offerings, including:
customized solutions for corporations; core speech technologies marketed to
OEM's; end user and retail applications for continuous speech products in
horizontal and vertical markets; and document creation, human and machine
translation services, Internet translation offerings, and linguistic tools.
L&H's products and services originate in four basic areas: automatic speech
recognition (ASR), text-to-speech (TTS), digital speech and music compression
(SMC), and text-to-text (translation).
This News Release contains forward-looking information that involves risks and
uncertainties, including statements about the company's plans, objectives,
expectations and intentions. Such statements include, without limitation,
discussions, concerning the company's strategic direction, new product
introductions and developments and market growth. Readers are cautioned that
forward looking statements include known and unknown risks, including
uncertainty of new product development, the risk that newly introduced products
may contain undetected errors or defects or otherwise not perform as
anticipated, early state of development of the speech, language and medical
information technology markets, the ability of L&H's customers to successfully
integrate and commercialize L&H's technology, the company's ability to predict
accurately the demand for its products in these emerging markets and to develop
strategies to address these markets successfully, the company's ability to
manage its growth and changing business, the company's ability to successfully
integrate the operations of Dictaphone and Dragon, the retention of key
technical and other personnel, risks associated with the financial leverage
associated with the company's assumption and/or repayment of Dictaphone
indebtedness, currency and other risks related to international operations,
rapid technological change and intense competition, as well as other risks set
forth in L&H's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The forward-
looking statements contained herein speak only as of the date of this News
Release.
# # #
L&H is a trademark of Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products N.V. in the United
States and/or other countries. All other product names or trademarks referenced
herein are trademarks of their respective owners.
L&H CONTACT INFO:
UNITED STATES: Michael Pettruzzello, (703) 299-9800, [email protected]
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EUROPE: Ron Schuermans, L&H, (32) 57-2295-24, [email protected]
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ASIA-PACIFIC: Geraldine Kan, L&H, (65) 799-8956, [email protected]
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