PLEASANTON, CA - iTradeNetwork Inc. (ITN), a privately-held technology leader in supply chain solutions for the food industry and Amphire® Solutions Inc., a privately-held, global provider of supply chain and purchasing solutions to the foodservice, beverage, hospitality and healthcare industries, today announced the signing of a definitive agreement to merge the two companies. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

The combined company, iTradeNetwork (ITN), will be the leading global foodservice, retail grocery, hospitality and healthcare industry supply chain network. Leveraging both companies' SaaS (softwareas-a-service) procurement and supply chain management solutions, as well as ITN's Spend Intelligence solutions (through ITN's recent acquisition of Instill), ITN will be uniquely capable of delivering one of the most comprehensive set of software applications to the food, hospitality and healthcare industries.

"Amphire and iTradeNetwork have been successful players in their respective area of market focus for nearly a decade," said Mark Barnekow, president and CEO of Amphire. "As the food industry finds itself increasingly under pressure from soaring fuel prices and food inflation, more customers will rely on technology to help improve their operations and reduce costs. We believe this is an excellent time to merge our businesses and leverage the resources of both companies."

Under the terms of the transaction, Robert Bonavito, founder and chief executive officer of iTradeNetwork, will serve as CEO of the combined company. Mark Barnekow, president and CEO of Amphire will serve as president of International with responsibility for international expansion, global marketing, strategy and merger and acquisitions. Both companies will retain their senior leadership teams.

According to Bonavito: "This is an exciting time for ITN and a substantial value creation opportunity for our customers. The ITN/Amphire merger will provide five major benefits from our combined company: 1) A next generation procurement platform for the foodservice, beer, wine and spirits, hospitality, and healthcare industries; 2) An established European operation with major customers (such as Bidvest/3663, Coors, Intercontinental Hotels, Real Hotels and Scottish and Newcastle); 3) The addition of major U.S. and Canadian customers (such as ARAMARK, Bunzl, DMA, Gordon Food Service, IJ Company and MBM); 4) Over 5,500+ manufacturers/suppliers; and 5) The ability to provide a single point of connectivity for all of our customers."

The transaction was partly facilitated by Accel-KKR, a technology-focused private equity firm that acquired a majority equity stake in iTradeNetwork in December 2007. Accel-KKR will continue to hold a majority equity stake in the combined company following the merger's completion.