Fast Search & Transfer (FAST) and Overture Services, Inc. have entered into an agreement under which Overture will acquire FAST’s Internet business unit for $70 million in cash, as well as performance-based cash incentive payments for up to $30 million over three years. Under the terms of the agreement, Overture will acquire FAST’s Internet business unit assets including FAST Web Search, AlltheWeb.com, and FAST PartnerSite products, related intellectual property rights, as well as data centers and equipment in Sacramento (USA) and London (UK). In addition, the FAST Internet business unit personnel will transfer to Overture. Overture has also licensed FAST Data Search. The agreement is subject to standard review and regulatory processes, which the two companies anticipate will be completed by April 2003. FAST will now focus on their enterprise search solutions, which is where most of their revenue has come from. www.fastsearch.com
Month: February 2003 (Page 2 of 6)
Canto announced the availability of Cumulus 5.5.2, a free upgrade to its cross
platform line of Digital Asset Management solutions for enterprises, workgroups and single users. In addition to bug fixes and improved user handling it includes enhancements in compatibility with Mac OS X Classic Mode and enhanced OPI. Cumulus 5.5.2 will be offered with an Update Installer so that the update process from earlier 5.5.x versions will be easy. Cumulus 5.5.2 offers an enhanced Pix Asset Converter which enables digital images cataloged in Cumulus to be converted into JPEG, TIFF and BMP formats, as well as conversion into RGB, CMYK and Greyscale color spaces with the simple click of a button. Changes in size per pixel, percentage and resolution are also possible. All filters released after the 5.5.1 release are now included in 5.5.2, containing filters for cataloging and reading specific metadata from EPS, PDF, BMP, IPTC, PNG, PBM and generic Unix files. The Cumulus OPI support will now also be available in connection with Server/Client AssetTransfer, a functionality of the Workgroup and Enterprise Edition. Also included is a Quark XTension update enabling users to Drag and Drop from Cumulus into Quark XPress 5.x. Cumulus 5.5.2 is immediately available for Mac OS, Windows, UNIX (Linux, Solaris) in English, German, French and Japanese. This service update will be available free for owners of Cumulus 5.5. Customers working with an older version may purchase an upgrade. www.canto.com
Xythos Software announced that it has signed a global OEM agreement with SAS. SAS will use the WebDAV-based Xythos WebFile Server (WFS) as the file management platform for SAS Drug Development and provide it to customers in the pharmaceutical, biomedical and medical device industries. With Xythos, SAS customers will use the Internet to securely access, manage, process and share all biopharmaceutical research data, analyses, reports and documents in the system. The integrated Xythos and SAS Drug Development solution helps close the gaps in the clinical development process by aggregating research data and documents from multiple, disparate sources and providing analytical and exploratory applications within a 21 CFR Part 11-enabling infrastructure. This provides researchers with a single, secure, centralized information repository where research information can be organized for regulatory submission and mined for new market opportunities, product line extensions or strategic safety assessments. www/xythos.com
Adobe Systems Incorporated announced the immediate availability of Adobe Form Server and Form Designer. Through the combination of XML, HTML and secure electronic forms in PDF, the updated software enables businesses to improve data capture processes beyond the firewall. Adobe Form Server 5.0 enables anyone to receive and view the form by automatically converting an XML template to PDF and various forms of HTML, depending on the device that is targeted to receive it. From PCs to handheld and wireless devices, forms can be delivered to multiple channels without downloads or plug-ins. With improved Adobe PDF integration, the Form Server allows end users to fill out a form either on-line or off-line. Additionally, the software improves the quality of data captured by including embedded calculations and validations. Adobe’s enterprise form solution also includes Adobe Form Designer 5.0, a tool for creating intelligent XML and PDF forms. The software automatically “tags” the data within the PDF document, which enables companies to leverage XML data by incorporating critical data and documents into existing enterprise systems. Adobe also shipped new versions of Adobe Output Designer 5.5, Adobe Central Output Server 5.5 and Adobe Output Pak for mySAP.com 5.5. Adobe server products are available immediately. Pricing for Adobe Form Designer starts at US$1,695. Adobe Form Server pricing starts at US$30,000 per CPU. www.adobe.com/products/server/products_purchase.html
Workshare announced the release of Workshare DeltaServer 1.0. Workshare DeltaServer is an evolution of Workshare DeltaView, the company’s document comparison software. The new product makes Workshare DeltaView’s comparison technology available in a server-based application. Workshare DeltaServer 1.0 is an application that organisations can deploy for comparisons of Microsoft Word documents. Designed to manage the creation and distribution of comparison documents, Workshare DeltaServer can be integrated with any major application used for document storing and sharing. With Workshare DeltaServer, a comparison document is created which details and highlights all content changes that take place between Microsoft Word document versions. In addition to the creation of the comparison document, Workshare DeltaServer produces detailed document comparison information regarding file input and change statistics. Once created, the comparison document can be saved to the desired repository as a txt, html, doc or pdf file to then be viewed, shared or archived. www.workshare.com
Interwoven Inc. has released a universal code and content distribution solution powered by a new version of Interwoven OpenDeploy. Available for the first time as a stand-alone offering, the new solution delivers a secure and automated way to simultaneously distribute code and content for Internet-based applications across a worldwide corporate network. The stand-alone offering can be used in conjunction with Interwoven TeamSite software as well as other content and code management software products. To broaden the number of distribution points for OpenDeploy, Interwoven has deepened relationships with Network Appliance and Akamai Technologies. Customers using OpenDeploy can integrate their content management with their content distribution requirements. This will enable users to distribute their content, applications and Web services code directly into a Network Appliance NetCache, or into EdgeSuite — Akamai’s global Content Distribution Service. Interwoven OpenDeploy 5.6 is available immediately. www.interwoven.com/products/content_distribution
Documentum announced the availability of Documentum eRoom Enterprise. eRoom Enterprise extends the Documentum ECM platform with a user-friendly work environment that can be quickly deployed, enabling content-centric and collaboration-centric processes and applications. Project teams can work together in virtual workspaces, and resulting collaborative content can be captured, stored, later referenced and integrated with other enterprise content and processes. With eRoom Enterprise, Documentum ECM customers can collaborate as they create, manage, share distribute and archive content, and existing eRoom customers can take advantage of Documentum’s ECM capabilities, to search, review, share, reuse and archive content created and saved within all eRoom team environments. eRoom Enterprise’s structured, ad hoc and real-time collaboration features help organizations to unify, streamline and leverage collaborative efforts and collective knowledge. www.documentum.com
Altova Inc. announced the availability of ready-to-use templates for the Research Information eXchange Markup Language (RIXML). The new RIXML templates, in conjunction with AUTHENTIC 5’s recently announced free software licensing model will enable faster adoption of XML content editing for the financial community based on the RIXML standard. The RIXML standard was developed by RIXML.org, a consortium committed the development and implementation of a standard for investment research. RIXML provides a structure for breaking down and classifying investment research so that users can access investment research in a customizable format through standard filtering criteria. Currently, financial services firms that publish research are using their own proprietary solutions. Therefore, this industry-wide standard facilitates a smoother exchange of information from producer to consumer, whether the information flows directly or via a third-party aggregator or vendor. www.altova.com
