the informer, page-89

alliances and agreements. ERG owns the technology that is licenced to Creative Star for use exclusively and only in Hong Kong---Creative Star is now known as Octopus Brussels, 9 November 1998 Proton state that Creative Star and ERG are joint venture partners, in Toronto both ERG and Creative Star are working together on the MTE's phase1. Octopus Cards has formed a consortium with Accenture, Thales and MTRC who are bidding with Cubic for the Netherlands whole of country contract.Proton has been adopted by Dutch banks universal Smartcard platform.an agreement with micro-chip manufacturer STMicroelectronics (ST) for the sale of ERG's 100% interest in Belgian-based Proton World (PW).Pursuant to the transaction, ST will grant ERG global rights to use the Proton technologies in ERG's transit smart card systems for 20 years through a licence agreement. In addition, ERG will retain exclusive access to a short-list of nominated transit customers for a five-year term. Under the terms of the agreement, ERG will sell all its shares in PWI to ST for a consideration of approximately A$110 million (e60million). After settlement of all inter-company accounts and payments for the global rights to the Proton technology, ERG will receive cash proceeds of approximately approximately63m to ERG Group after repayment of intercompany loans (e37 million) at settlement. A milestone fee of approximately A$40.9 million (e22.5 million) is payable to ERG on deferred terms tied to milestones over the next ten years. The milestones relate to the sale to ERG or its customers of smart cards that incorporate an ST chip.