BURLINGTON, MA, October 22 2002—Kids Headquarters, North America's largest distributor of children's apparel, has turned to Cognos (NASDAQ: COGN; TSX: CSN), to gain better visibility into operations, sharpen its competitive edge, and continue to fuel double-digit revenue growth. Kids HQ client roster includes the clothing industry's biggest names such as Walmart, target, Kmart, JC Penny, Sears, May Corp and Federated Stores.

Kids HQ needed to provide in-depth performance reports to customers and support the decision-making capabilities for senior management. With Cognos, Kids HQ is delivering fast and accurate reports on shipping and inventory status, improving response times to customers, and gaining improved business planning capabilities. With licensed brands that include Disney, Nickelodeon, Kenneth Cole Reaction, Timberland and Rocawear, Cognos enables Kids HQ to gain unprecedented insight into brand performance across all retail outlets.

"We evaluated several business intelligence vendors and selected Cognos based on its powerful data integration technology, as well as its superior reporting and analysis solution," said Kevin Downs, chief technology officer, Kids HQ. "With Cognos Series 7, we are improving our agility and reacting quickly to changing market conditions. Cognos also enables us to raise the bar on the level of customer services and accountability that we provide."

As Kids HQ's retail presence expands, Cognos enables easy aggregation of data from all locations, giving managers a 360-degree view of operations across the company and eliminating the manual processes previously associated with this level of reporting. "With Cognos, we now have mission-critical data on product development, factory performance, inventory, and sales at our fingertips. We are able to drill down to the detail level to really understand the key drivers behind operations, and as a result dramatically improve product planning," said Downs.

"Cognos Series 7 is the industry's leading and most comprehensive solution, offering a full range of BI capabilities built to meet the complex and changing information needs of today's companies," said Dave Laverty, senior vice president, global marketing, Cognos. "Cognos is enabling companies to strategically plan, monitor, and assess the future of business quickly and effectively, supporting their corporate performance management initiatives."

About Kids Headquarters:
Kids Headquarters, founded in 1994, is a full service apparel corporation. Headquartered in New York City with offices in Hong Kong, Manila, Bangkok and Indonesia, we employ over 550 people worldwide. Our products range from newborn through adult apparel. Kids Headquarters services every major retailer throughout the United States via it's diverse portfolio of proprietary brands, character licenses and national brands.