Category: Marketing & e-commerce (Page 73 of 77)

Uniscape announced the launch of its E-Services Translation Portal (ETP), Uniscape.com, a vertical marketplace for translation services that enables businesses to conduct multi-lingual e-commerce. Uniscape.com will enable companies to make human translation quicker, more efficient and reusable. Using Uniscape.com, companies will have the ability to work with translators anywhere in the world and offer them free use of Uniscape’s XML-based Translator Studio. The technology is designed specifically to aid the human translation process by offering access to a scalable translation memory database, workflow automation, content management, reporting and filtering technology. As the translators do their work, it is captured in a scalable translation memory database, where it can be automatically reused across a company’s future translation projects. When content is updated on a Web site or new content is created, the system automatically checks to see if the key terminology, sentences or paragraphs have ever been translated previously. Prior translations are automatically pulled from the database and translators complete the partially translated files using Translator Studio. Companies are charged a minimal transaction fee of a few pennies for each word processed, with discounts based on the overall translation volume and percentage of reuse. Workflow automation automatically routes files and communications between content producers, translators, reviewers, quality assurance and publishers; according to a company’s own business rules and objectives. Reporting capabilities enable companies to track every aspect of their translation and publishing activities. The site will be open in September. Pricing is determined by number of words to be translated and volume of reuse. www.uniscape.com

Andromedia, Inc. announced LikeMinds Personalization Server 3.0. LikeMinds Personalization Server 3.0 makes the most of every click by utilizing virtually any source of consumer behavior data — be it online or offline, implicit or explicit, real time or historical, transactional or navigational — to personalize every interaction from the first click to the final checkout. LikeMinds Personalization Server 3.0 introduces two new personalization engines: The Purchase Engine and the Clickstream Engine. The Purchase Engine enables e-commerce vendors to leverage valuable offline and/or online purchase history data to make personalized recommendations. The Clickstream Engine builds customer profiles in real-time, based on navigational data gathered as customers browse a site. This allows an e-commerce vendor who lacks purchase history data and doesn’t want to force users to fill out lengthy questionnaires to still offer personalized content and product recommendations. The new engines enable LikeMinds to learn by unobtrusively observing online navigational behavior and shopping activities and automatically adapt in real-time to changes in users’ tastes and preferences. The Clickstream and Purchase Engines complement the Preference Engine and Product Matching Engine, which were built into previous versions of LikeMinds Personalization Server. The Preference Engine leverages explicitly stated preferences. The Product Matching Engine makes recommendations based on product similarities, enabling vendors to immediately recommend new products, before customers have seen, rated, or bought them. No other personalization solution offers e-marketers so many options for leveraging consumer behavior data to personalize interactions with users on their Web sites. LikeMinds Personalization Server 3.0 requires Windows NT 4.0 running on Pentium-class PCs or Solaris 2.6 running on Sun SPARC stations or Ultra SPARC workstations, any CGI-compliant Web server, and ODBC-compliant databases including Oracle 8 and SQL Server 7.0. LikeMinds Personalization Server 3.0 is priced from $25,000 and is available immediately. www.andromedia.com

XMLSolutions Corporation announced the completion of a $3.6 million round in venture capital financing with Verticality Investment Group, LLC, a Jersey City, N.J.-based venture capital firm that invests in private technology companies. The investment, which marks the company’s first round of funding, will be used to continue the rapid expansion of XMLSolutions’ superior professional services group and accelerate deployment of the Exeter family of e-commerce software products. The Exeter family of products will be released on August 1, 1999. www.xmls.com

Bowstreet Software, Inc. announced that it will lead work to define an industry standard for describing directory service information in XML. The effort to develop a Directory Services Markup Language (DSML) builds upon work performed by Bowstreet while creating its Web Services Architecture. The DSML effort will be supported by industry leaders IBM, Microsoft, Novell, Oracle, and the Sun-Netscape Alliance to provide customers more flexibility in using and sharing directory information in XML-enabled applications. DSML provides a way to use directory information without knowing the specific data formats of each directory. End users will benefit because Web-based applications can be aware of their directory policy and profile information and adapt accordingly. Additionally, DSML enables “friction-free” eCommerce value chains to be integrated across corporate boundaries based on directory information. This capability provides an essential building block as directories play a more significant role on the Internet. Furthermore, DSML complements the goals of the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) and helps to extend the power of LDAP to web-based applications. Bowstreet and supporting companies plan to submit a proposal to appropriate standards bodies. There is an information Web site at www.dsml.org. Additional group members are expected to be added in the future. www.bowstreet.com

Information Architects Corporation has received a Notice of Allowance from the U.S. Patent Office covering its Web application server technologies. The patent allowance covers technologies at the core of Information Architects’ (iA) Metaphoria Virtual Web Server products. Metaphoria enables rapid development of Internet products and applications for business users that require efficient access to data from multiple sources. Metaphoria enables data residing in mainframes, client server systems, web servers, Internets and Extranets to be divorced, parsed, combined, personalized and viewed REAL-TIME from any Internet accessible device such as a PC, PDA, WebTV, Palm VII or WinCE device. Metaphoria can not only let the user view selected data but it can update the data across multiple systems in real time with the click of the mouse. www.ia.com

Macromedia, Inc. announced a definitive agreement under which Macromedia will acquire Elemental Software for $24 million in a stock for stock transaction. Elemental’s products Drumbeat 2000 and eStore Builder combined with Macromedia’s products like Dreamweaver and Generator, will enable Web developers to create dynamic Web sites for e-commerce, corporate intranets and personalized content. The addition of the Elemental products to Macromedia’s Web publishing product family provides a standards-based end-to-end solution of software for efficiently creating, producing and maintaining dynamic Web sites that automate the process of linking database information to Web applications with reusable code. In the transaction, Macromedia will exchange approximately 625,000 shares of its stock for all of the outstanding equity of Elemental, for a total purchase price of approximately $24 million. The transaction will be accounted for as a pooling of interests, and is expected to close within 45 days, subject to satisfaction of customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals. Macromedia expects to take a one-time charge of approximately $3.0 million for expenses related to the acquisition in the current quarter. www.macromedia.com

Webb Interactive Services, Inc. announced a technology partnership with Switchboard, Inc., focused on bringing Webb’s XML-based community publishing and commerce platform to Switchboard’s network of merchants, users and distribution partners. Switchboard, Inc., a majority-held subsidiary of Banyan Worldwide is a leading Internet directory that represents thousands of merchants nationwide. Webb’s XML-based Internet publishing and advertising platform will strengthen online business/consumer interaction in areas such as offer management and comparison-shopping. This will allow consumers to easily find merchants who best fit their needs, and merchants will be able to interact with targeted consumers more effectively. Switchboard will integrate Webb’s technology into its merchant services on Switchboard.com and through its distribution network. No financial terms of the partnership were disclosed. The partnership with Switchboard is the first deployment of Webb’s e-commerce platform using XML. www.webb.net

Interleaf announced the establishment of “the e-content company. ” Recognized as a separate business segment, the e-content company is dedicated to the development of XML-based content management solutions for e-business applications. The e-content company develops and delivers BladeRunner, the division’s solution that provides end-to-end content management solution for e-business applications. BladeRunner enables companies to create, manage, and publish e-content – targeted, timely, personalized, intelligent business information – for web-enabled applications using XML as its technology backbone and Microsoft Word for content creation. Companies are able to apply intelligence, structure and style to their business information, generate output in a variety of formats, and dynamically integrate that information with other electronic and business processes in support of their e-business initiatives. BladeRunner enables organizations to leverage information content and facilitate business transactions through the information chain, connecting companies with their customers, suppliers and distributors. In addition to the establishment of the new business segment, the e-content company will launch their own website, www.xmlecontent.com when it goes live on July 12, 1999. www.interleaf.com