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Exhibit 99.1
APPLIED GRAPHICS TECHNOLOGIES ANNOUNCES
EXECUTIVE CHANGES
NEW YORK, DECEMBER 1, 2000 - Applied Graphics Technologies, Inc.
(NASDAQ: AGTX), the country's largest provider of outsourced digital media asset
management services, today announced that Derek Ashley has resigned as the
Company's Vice Chairman, director, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Operating
Officer in order to return to his home in the United Kingdom. The Company also
announced that the Board of Directors has begun the process of identifying
candidates for chief executive officer, and that Joseph Vecchiolla, the
Company's Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, will expand his
role with the Company to become Chief Operating Officer. Mr. Ashley will remain
with the Company until mid-January 2001 to assist in the transition process.
"We are extremely fortunate to have as part of our senior management an
executive as talented and experienced as Joe Vecchiolla," said Mort Zuckerman,
Chairman of the Board of Directors. "Mr. Vecchiolla, who has been with the
Company since May of this year, has already played a critical leadership role in
the Company's recently improved performance and paydown of debt, and the Board
is confident that he will continue his outstanding performance in his expanded
role as Chief Operating Officer."
Mr. Zuckerman added, "Since joining the Company in May 1999 in
connection with the Wace acquisition, Mr. Ashley has applied his efforts
diligently to integrating the Company's operations, improving the Company's
performance and reducing the Company's debt. We have started to see the results
of his efforts, with the Company having just reported its first period of
positive earnings in five quarters. Although the Company still faces challenges,
we believe that Mr. Ashley has helped to put the Company on the right track."
Applied Graphics Technologies, Inc. provides digital media production
services across all forms of media, including print, broadcast and the Internet
and is a leading application service provider for the on-line management of
brands. AGT offers a variety of digital imaging and related services to major
corporations, which include magazine and newspaper publishers, advertisers and
their agencies, entertainment companies, catalogers, retailers, and consumer
goods and packaging companies. From locations across the United States, the
United Kingdom and Australia, AGT supplies a complete range of services that are
tailored to provide solutions for specific customer needs, with a focus on
improving and standardizing the management and delivery of visual
communications for clients on a local, national and international basis.
Additionally, AGT provides a wide range of advertising and marketing-related
creative services for customers, primarily in retailing. These services include
assistance in creation of newspaper advertising campaigns, development of
in-store and collateral media and photographic services. AGT also provides
content management and the volume reproduction and distribution of television
and radio commercials to broadcast and cable media for ad agencies and their
clients. Finally, through its Devon Publishing Group, AGT is a leading
publisher of alternative greeting cards, calendars and fine art and other
prints and wall decor items.
Certain statements in this press release may contain "forward-looking
statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act
of 1995. Such statements are inherently subject to known and unknown risks,
uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, performance or
achievements of the Company to be materially different from those expected or
anticipated in the forward-looking statements. Such factors are described in the
Company's SEC filings, including its quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and its
annual reports on Form 10-K and Form 10-K/A.
Additional information about Applied Graphics Technologies can be
obtained by visiting the AGT website: http://www.agt.com.
