Allete Selects OpenPages SOX Express for Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance

April 3, 2006

Waltham, Mass. - April 3, 2006 -OpenPages, the leading provider of enterprise governance, risk and compliance management (GRCM) solutions, today announced that ALLETE, Inc. (NYSE: ALE) has selected OpenPages Sarbanes-Oxley Express (SOX Express) for its Sarbanes-Oxley compliance initiatives. SOX Express will allow ALLETE to automate the company’s ongoing test and review of its internal controls documentation in order to reduce the time and resource costs associated with Section 404 and 302 compliance.

ALLETE, which is headquartered in Duluth, Minnesota, provides energy services in the upper Midwest and has significant real estate holdings in Florida. More information about the company is available on ALLETE’s Web site at www.allete.com.

“We selected OpenPages because of its functionality, flexibility and price,” said Lori Frisk, manager of applications, ALLETE, Inc. “SOX Express provides an easy-to-use environment to facilitate communication of process documentation, internal controls and testing information. With SOX Express, we expect to reduce the time and resource costs associated with ongoing compliance.”

OpenPages SOX Express is an enterprise compliance management solution that reduces the time and resource costs associated with ongoing compliance for Sections 302 and 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. SOX Express combines powerful document management, business process management and flexible reporting capabilities in an extremely easy-to-use environment that enables an organization to document financial controls and automate the ongoing test and review process. Completely web-based, SOX Express maximizes end-user participation with little training. Its dashboards can be used by project managers, documentation team members, internal auditors and external auditors to plan, document and test the internal controls framework of the company, and to attest to the financial statements.

About OpenPages

OpenPages® is the leading provider of enterprise risk management solutions that optimize business performance. OpenPages empowers the world’s largest companies by unifying governance, risk and compliance across the enterprise and by incorporating risk management into day-to-day business processes. Founded in 1996, the company is headquartered in Waltham, Massachusetts, with international offices in Japan and the United Kingdom, and regional offices throughout North America.

For questions or for more information on OpenPages' enterprise risk management solutions, please click here or call us at 781.693.5999.