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Infowave Launches Wireless E-mail Service
Posted Wednesday, February 20, 2002 by PDA Center
Infowave Launches Self-Installable Wireless Email Service
For Corporate PocketPC- and Palm-Powered Device Users
Infowave Symmetry Pro provides user-friendly, secure access to corporate email, attachments, calendar and more for professionals when they’re away from their desks
Consumer Electronics Show - Las Vegas, NV – January 8, 2002 –Infowave Software (TSE: IW) today announced the debut of Infowave Symmetry Pro, a new, secure wireless email software service for Palm- and PocketPC-powered device users to access corporate email, contacts, attachments and calendar information while away from their desks. It delivers an “always-on” experience that fully utilizes the capabilities of the user’s existing or new wireless device. Unlike any other software or service today, Infowave Symmetry Pro will impact a significant portion of the wireless market because it supports both Palm and Pocket PC operating systems, making it compatible with handheld devices from Compaq (NYSE: CPQ), Handspring (Nasdaq: HAND), Palm (Nasdaq: PALM), and more. Symmetry Pro offers a brand new software service that the industry has been lacking – providing busy professionals with an easy and self-serve way to wirelessly increase work efficiency and provide flexibility for a more balanced life.
Starting today, Symmetry Pro’s exclusive preview edition is available at www.symmetrypro.com - allowing a limited number of users a rare opportunity to try the software service for free for 30 days before committing to an inexpensive monthly service charge. New users of Symmetry Pro will always be able to try before they buy with a free evaluation period.
“The launch of Infowave Symmetry Pro marks an exciting breakthrough for mobile professionals everywhere. Infowave is excited to deliver an innovative new service that brings to market what has been missing from wireless data until today - useful, easy, try-before-you -buy solutions that can be self-installed on the latest new devices,” said Infowave CEO Thomas Koll. “Infowave Symmetry Pro empowers users to make their current or brand-new handheld device even more useful as a business tool allowing them to stay connected while away from the desk. Symmetry Pro gives people a significant competitive edge at work and the peace of mind of being connected and in control no matter where they are.”
Symmetry Pro fulfills need in market:
Increasingly, knowledge workers are bringing devices into the workplace themselves with the desire to do more than just offline or sync-based activities. Whether it’s a consultant or sales person at a customer site or an executive on the golf course, Infowave Symmetry Pro gives people the freedom to leave their desks and still remain connected to email, calendar and personal information management (PIM) data they need on the device they choose. It can be used with virtually any carrier network, from AT&T Wireless and Sprint to Deutsche Telekom and Vodafone, and is compatible with CDPD, CDMA, GPRS and GSM, a key criterion for mobile workers who travel frequently and want the flexibility to roam or choose an airtime plan that best suits them.
“Infowave’s Symmetry Pro service is innovative and well-timed. Mobile workers have not curbed their appetite for being informed in the past year, nor have they stopped buying their own mobile devices to try and access the information they need to be productive and competitive despite the IT spending slowdown,” said J. Gerry Purdy, President & CEO of industry research firm Mobile Insights. “Giving end-users the ability to self-install the solution is a key success factor in getting more people working wirelessly and Infowave has accounted for that with Symmetry Pro. From a macro level, the fact that this service is coming from an enterprise wireless veteran is significant because Infowave can offer an upgrade path to an enterprise product line, once the demand by end-users creates the need for a wireless strategy that’s company-wide. This provides some very compelling partnering opportunities and synergy across the industry.”
Symmetry Pro creates market synergy:
Infowave Symmetry Pro creates a catalyst for wireless data adoption and use across the industry by providing the ability to access the information business professionals care about--corporate email--and creating a suitable travel alternative to carrying a heavy laptop around town or across the country. It brings together handheld device manufacturers, modem manufacturers and airtime providers and creates synergy among the various solution providers that benefits end-users with its easy to try and install solution.
“The Symmetry Pro service is an important new innovation for Compaq customers because it allows mobile professionals using any wirelessly-enabled Compaq iPAQ Pocket PC to access their corporate email, attachments, calendar and other content, anytime, when away from the office,” said Jerry Meerkatz, vice president and general manager, Enterprise Mobility Solutions at Compaq Computer Corporation. “In addition, the service provides an excellent way for corporations to evaluate a wireless messaging solution while providing an easy upgrade to enterprise-class solutions featuring the Infowave Wireless Business Engine which our global sales and services teams already sell and install. As a premier partner, Compaq has been working with Infowave on the Symmetry Pro service during its development phase and is pleased that the preview edition is available now.”
"Wireless connectivity to information is becoming a necessity for today's workforce to increase productivity, maintain a balanced lifestyle and command a competitive edge," said Bobbi Burns, acting director of strategic alliances for Handspring. "Wireless products and services are just as much personal communications tools as they are enterprise computing tools and will be adopted by both individuals and corporations. Handspring agrees with Infowave's approach of providing scalable software solutions like Symmetry Pro that can be tailored to the individual while also enabling migration to enterprise grade solutions."
Symmetry Pro provides a revenue stream for the wireless carrier as well as the elusive increased network stickiness wireless network operators care about. It provides them with a low-risk value-added service that they can offer to subscribers without requiring a lengthy custom project some vendors are promoting that will result in millions of dollars spent and time lost before delivering a compelling solution. By branding and offering Symmetry Pro to subscribers as their own solution, we believe carriers can immediately take advantage of their 2G and newly-built 2.5 G networks and realize an immediate up-tick in average revenue per user (ARPU). Even if they don’t offer their own version of Symmetry Pro, carriers still benefit from Symmetry Pro in the form of more customers using wireless data airtime.
For wireless modem manufacturers, Symmetry Pro provides a compelling reason for users to make their mobile device wireless, increasing demand for wireless modem cards.
“Sierra Wireless and Infowave have worked together through the Wireless Ready Alliance to offer complete solutions to enterprise customers who are already benefiting from wireless access to email, Web-based applications and legacy applications,” said Mark McMillan, Vice President, Sierra Wireless (Nasdaq: SWIR; TSE: SW). Symmetry Pro will enable individual users to try a very useful product without creating a major project for the corporate IT department, which paves the way toward adoption of a wider array of wireless applications.”
“Novatel Wireless is very excited about the potential for Infowave Symmetry Pro to help drive usage of wireless computing in the enterprise. ” said Owen Thistle, VP of CDPD and Embedded Products at Novatel Wireless (Nasdaq: NVTL). “Now business professionals can take their handheld device and Novatel Wireless modem to the next level with software that gives them seamless and timely access to their corporate email, calendar, contacts and tasks. We’re working closely with Infowave to ensure that Symmetry Pro can make use of specific Novatel Wireless hardware features to provide even greater capabilities to end-users.”
How Symmetry Pro works -- product specifics:
It’s easy for a mobile professional to purchase and self-install Infowave Symmetry Pro– without requiring assistance from the company’s IT personnel. By simply going to www.symmetrypro.com and following the installation wizard, users can be up and running with wireless corporate email in minutes.
Symmetry Pro works with the most sophisticated mobile computing devices available today and supports a variety of wireless networks, giving users maximum flexibility.
And, Symmetry Pro is more than just e-mail – on capable devices it will provide attachments, Web links and other important data that is not visible when viewing data on a less sophisticated device or text-messaging pager.
Symmetry Pro gives users the ability to perform all of the key desktop functions most critical to users while away from their desk as well as some innovative features critical to and useful in the wireless domain. Some of these features include the following:
• creating new email, replying to and forwarding messages seamlessly as if the user is at his desk
• accessing daily calendar and accepting meeting requests; keeping users informed of changes in their schedules by forwarding a daily calendar summary and changes as they happen
• searching for contacts in the personal or global Outlook address book
• searching for and retrieving old messages not downloaded or synched while remote
• selectively forward email to the user’s wireless device based on a set of forwarding/blocking rules the user defines
• truncating messages for faster email transfer, giving users a preview of the message content and a choice to download a message in full
• forwarding attachments without downloading them first
Synchronization and security
Symmetry Pro offers conduits for existing desktop synchronization software including HotSync for Palm operating systems and ActiveSync for Pocket PC and is also compliant with many third-party conduits.
Symmetry Pro is a fully secure messaging service. Before messages are forwarded from the desktop to the device, they are fully encrypted and are not decrypted until they arrive on the handheld device. The encryption keys are never transmitted wirelessly, only by local synchronization. Furthermore, the user’s login credentials are not stored anywhere on the system, so the privacy and integrity of their messages is fully guaranteed. Symmetry Pro can be used in almost any corporate IT environment, since the desktop communicates with the service using outbound HTTPS only. This means the user can install Symmetry Pro without violating existing corporate IT security policy.
System requirements:
In order to use Symmetry Pro, users must have a wirelessly enabled device, which uses the Palm or Pocket PC operating system, Microsoft Exchange 5.5 or 2000, Microsoft Windows 98, Windows 2000 or Windows NT; Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 or higher; and constant Internet access.
Availability:
The Infowave Symmetry Pro Exclusive Preview Edition is available today at www.symmetrypro.com. A limited number of users will be allowed to download Symmetry Pro free of charge for 30 days to evaluate the software service. Symmetry Pro will be commercially available in late February by subscription; however, Infowave will continue to offer a 14-day “try-then-buy” trial. Symmetry Pro also will be available through leading mobile computing reseller Mobile Planet in late February.
About Infowave Software
Infowave (TSE: IW) builds innovative wireless business solutions for individual mobile professionals and large organizations that connect people to the critical information they need to be more productive and competitive. The Infowave Wireless Business Engine and its suite of application connectors provide companies with a single wireless software computing standard for fast, secure and reliable wireless access to email and collaboration applications, Web-based applications, the Internet, corporate intranets and legacy and client/server applications from a centrally managed platform. Infowave Symmetry Pro provides individuals with a fast, convenient, easy to install solution for wireless corporate email on Palm- and Pocket PC-powered devices. Infowave’s solutions are designed to work on most carrier networks today, including GPRS, GSM, CDPD, CDMA and across the full spectrum of wireless computing devices from laptop computers to web-enabled mobile phones and PDAs to the newest generation of integrated voice/data handheld devices. For more information, please visit www.infowave.com or www.symmetrypro.com.
Forward-Looking Statement
This news release contains certain forward-looking statements based on the current expectations of Infowave and projections about future events. Forward-looking statements in this release include statements regarding the market acceptance and impact of Infowave’s Symmetry Pro software; the benefits to potential third-party carriers of the Symmetry Pro software; the compatibility of Symmetry Pro with current or new operating systems, networks, software and wireless devices; ability of customers to install and use Symmetry Pro without assistance from the users’ IT personnel; the ability of Infowave to drive usage of wireless computing in the enterprise; and the effectiveness of the privacy and security features of the Symmetry Pro Software. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in these statements based upon a number of factors including the deployment, acceptance and success of Infowave’s Symmetry Pro software solution, any unforeseen incompatibilities among Infowave’s technology and other operating systems, networks, software and wireless devices; any technical difficulties related to integrating Infowave’s technology and the technology of other operating systems, networks, software, and wireless devices; the possibility of technical difficulties or delays in future product introductions and improvements; product development, product pricing or other initiatives of Infowave’s competitors and other risks and uncertainties described in Infowave’s Form 10-K filed with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission.
Forward-looking statements are based upon management’s beliefs, opinions and projections on the date the statements are made. Infowave undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements if circumstances or management’s beliefs, opinions or projections should change.
Press Contacts:
Heather Knox
425.806.3129
CES number: 206.321.8072
hknox@infowave.com
James Greco
425.806.3141
CES number: 206.604.1242
jgreco@infowave.com
Investor Contact:
Jim Rausch
604.473-3686
jrausch@infowave.com
Editor’s note:
See Infowave’s Symmetry Pro at CES 2002 – LVCC South Hall 3-4, Booth 14714
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