Toronto, Ontario, March 25, 2009 – CGI Group Inc. (TSX: GIB.A; NYSE: GIB), a leading provider of information technology and business process services and ForestersTM, a mission-based life insurance organization, today announced a 10 year, $182 million, infrastructure, application maintenance and development outsourcing services agreement. This agreement will extend the existing infrastructure services outsourcing agreement by seven years, and will see 78 Foresters IT employees transition to CGI.
CGI will deliver IT application maintenance and development services from its centers of excellence in Toronto, Halifax and Bangalore while IT infrastructure services including data center mainframe, voice communications, IT help desk and distributed computing services will be delivered from its centers in Ontario.
“Foresters is pleased to expand its existing strategic relationship with CGI for the provision of IT services in North America,” said George Mohacsi, President and Chief Executive Officer, Foresters. “As a result of this agreement, we will have the operational excellence and improved service delivery to support Foresters continued growth in providing quality life insurance and delivering on our mission to our members in the coming years.”
“As part of our business and technology transformation initiatives, Foresters was looking for a business partner that could help us take advantage of global delivery capabilities with solid skills and experience in the life insurance industry,” said Peter Sweers, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, Foresters. “CGI has proven to be an ideal fit, able to provide us with a cost effective way of achieving our goals. Foresters is now better positioned to profitably grow its business.”
“CGI is committed to delivering high quality IT services to the life insurance industry and we are delighted to broaden our services partnership with Foresters to a full IT outsourcing model,” said Doug McCuaig, Senior Vice-President and General Manager, Ontario, Atlantic & Western Canada, CGI. “We are proud that Foresters continues to rely on CGI to improve IT service delivery processes and very pleased to welcome new members with such deep subject matter expertise.”
About Foresters
Founded in 1874 as a fraternal benefit society, Foresters™ champions the well being of families through quality life insurance, unique member benefits and inspiring community activities. Foresters has assets of more than $6.2 billion with liabilities of $5.0 billion resulting in a surplus of $1.2 billion (all figures in Canadian dollars as of December 31, 2008) and maintains an “A” (Excellent) rating by A.M. Best. Foresters shares its financial strength with more than 650,000 members in Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom. Foresters Equity Services, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Foresters, offers investment products in the U.S. Unity Life of Canada, a wholly owned subsidiary of Foresters, represents Foresters in Canada. Foresters is celebrating its 135th anniversary in 2009. For more information, please visit www.foresters.com.
About CGI
Founded in 1976, CGI Group Inc. is one of the largest independent information technology and business process services firms in the world. CGI and its affiliated companies employ approximately 25,000 professionals. CGI provides end-to-end IT and business process services to clients worldwide from offices in Canada, the United States, Europe, Asia Pacific as well as from centers of excellence in North America, Europe and India. CGI’s annual revenue run rate stands at $4.0 billion and at December 31, 2008, CGI’s order backlog was $11.4 billion. CGI shares are listed on the TSX (GIB.A) and the NYSE (GIB) and are included in the S&P/TSX Composite Index as well as the S&P/TSX Capped Information Technology and MidCap Indices. Website: www.cgi.com.
