First Quarter Update

Sopheon PLC
29 May 2001


                                                                    29 May 2001


SOPHEON PLC


2001 FIRST QUARTER UPDATE


Sopheon plc ('Sopheon') issues its trading update statement for the three
months ended 31 March 2001 in accordance with the requirements of the Euronext
Amsterdam. As already set out in our statement of 30 March, the first quarter
has seen a number of significant events for Sopheon.



The year started with the appointment of Dr. Bernard Al, former CEO of Wolters
Kluwer Netherlands, to our board of directors.  Dr. Al brings to the board
extensive experience in the information services industry.  His appointment
underlines our belief that content is a critical part of our offering.



Embodied by our recently launched Accolade solution, our emphasis on migrating
our business strategy to an integrated software-services-content model
continued to gather pace in the quarter, keeping us on track to deliver
significant growth in the second half of the year.



In January we announced the addition of portfolio management, process
benchmarking and new-product diagnostic modules to the Accolade suite, and
proceeded with beta release of the solution in March, right on schedule.
Several highly successful seminars were held during the period to support our
marketing efforts in the New Product Development sector, generating a number
of opportunities for our sales teams.  At the end of the quarter we were
actively pursuing 44 leads, and had another 59 qualified prospects in the
pipeline. These included several blue chip companies on both sides of the
Atlantic that we are moving down our sales funnel. In the quarter, we signed
Pennzoil, Cargill and SABIC for Accolade projects.  A sustained campaign to
recruit business partners and resellers yielded success as alliances were
signed with leading science and technology portals yet2.com, eFunda,
EnviroXchange and BioSpace.  We also entered into a strategic marketing
agreement with Hewlett Packard.  Concurrent with these successes, our
traditional business areas continued to support revenues during the quarter,
as challenging market conditions extended into 2001.  A good example of this
activity was our winning of the Seagram Spirits and Wine Group contract to
support deployment of a web based virtual workplace, announced to the trade in
February.



The quarter ended with the announcement of our proposed all-paper acquisition
of a profitable operating division of Aventis Research and Technology based in
Frankfurt. The transaction is progressing well and due diligence is now
broadly completed. Completion of the acquisition will deliver to Sopheon an
experienced team of people with a skill mix and business vision closely
aligned with our own, as well as a relationship with one of the world's
leading pharmaceutical companies. The acquisition will significantly enhance
the depth and reach of Sopheon's position in mainland Europe and will extend
both our customer base and our strength in the key life sciences market.





For further information contact :


Barry Mence, Chairman  Sopheon plc                Tel : + 44 (0) 1483-883000

Arif Karimjee, CFO     Sopheon plc                Tel : + 44 (0) 1483-883000
Steve Liebmann         Buchanan Communications    Tel : + 44 (0) 207-466-5000
Barbara Jansen         Citigate First Financial   Tel : + 31 (0) 205-754-080