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Spyglass Announces Immediate Availability of Device Mail 3.1, Small Footprint Email Product for Televisions, Mobile Phones and Handheld Computers Motorola is First Announced Customer SAN JOSE, CALIF. - Tuesday, November 3, 1998 - Spyglass� Inc. (NASDAQ: SPYG) today announced the availability of a new embedded email product for consumer devices such as televisions, mobile phones and handheld computers. Built specifically for consumer electronics manufacturers, Spyglass Device Mail 3.1 is a standards-based, embedded email client that requires very little memory and can be easily integrated into existing consumer electronic product lines. Spyglass is demonstrating this technology here at the Embedded Systems Conference in booth #1636. The first announced customer is Motorola. Motorola will add the email functionality to their Blackbird Multimedia Platform. Spyglass Device Mail is based on the same embedded Internet client architecture as Spyglass Device Mosaic, the industry-leading small footprint browser for non-PC devices. Spyglass also announced today the immediate availability of Spyglass Device Mosaic 3.1, designed to serve as an application platform for digital cable, satellite, wireless, and other non-PC products. Because it shares the same graphics library as Spyglass Device Mosaic - the Spyglass ThinGUI - Spyglass Device Mail maintains a consistent look and feel with the browser application. By sharing the graphics library and some other components with the browser, as is the case in the Motorola Blackbird, the overall memory budget is kept down. In non-PC environments, such as cable television set-top boxes, memory is at a premium. Consequently, applications must be kept small and the ability to re-use pieces of technology throughout many applications, as is the case with Spyglass Device Mail and Spyglass Device Mosaic, is a valuable benefit in terms of both size and application quality. Analysts continue to point to email as the key reason consumers use the Internet. According to a recent survey from Yankee Group, 69 percent of online users rank email as the most important online application. "Spyglass Device Mail allows consumer electronics manufacturers to integrate the Internet's 'killer-app' across multiple appliances," says Spyglass General Manager Randy Littleson, "Email is still the number one reason why consumers get on-line and stay on-line." Spyglass Device Mail is available as both a standalone product or as a companion to Spyglass' industry leading embedded Web browser, Spyglass Device Mosaic. Spyglass is also currently providing manufacturers with custom engineering resources, through Spyglass Professional Services, to add Spyglass Device Mail to their products. Spyglass Device Mail is designed for the embedded or real-time operating systems that are already commonly used by consumer electronics and office equipment manufacturers. Consequently, the email functionality can be added without requiring a re-design of the product to accommodate it. "Most manufacturers are already working with the same companies we are -- ISI, Microware, Lynx, Microsoft, PowerTV or Wind River," continued Littleson. "With Spyglass Device Mail, we bring them the functionality they need on technology that they are already using. Our customers are interested in adding features, not necessarily in adding new and expensive core competencies to get those features." Device Mail supports the major Internet messaging standards, SMTP and IMAP4, and can be extended to support POP3. Because it is standards-based, televisions or mobile phones with Spyglass Device Mail will be able to work with any ISP and not require a proprietary dial-up network. A customer's TV could also talk to a mail server at a person's place of work, making it possible to easily integrate home email accounts with professional ones, eliminating the need for multiple accounts - a major drawback to some current Internet device email products. Spyglass Device Mail was built from the ground up for devices, not stripped down from the desktop environment. As a result, the features most relevant for consumer electronics were built first, and the overall size of the product was not inflated with inappropriate functionality. "Tremendous demand exists for an email package that is truly meant to be integrated with devices," said Littleson. "Whether companies simply want the line on the box that says 'comes with email' or they are looking to bundle email with a complete Web browsing package, we can meet those needs." About Spyglass Device Mail: � Small Footprint -- Mail clients for devices need to be small. Spyglass Device Mail is under half a megabyte, which will reduce the overall cost of manufacturing the device. � Standards Based -- Supports Internet messaging standards, meaning any Internet Service Provider (ISP) can provide connectivity, billing and mail service. � Flexible -- Provides the flexibility necessary to customize the user interface, add special functionality or extend the core mail architecture for specific needs through well-documented API calls, architecture description, and commented source code. � Portable -- Integrates easily with existing hardware because it is designed to work with many of the operating systems and chipsets already found on devices. Spyglass Professional Services Easily ported to a variety of popular real-time operating systems, Spyglass Device Mail enables device manufacturers to add electronic messaging to products quickly, cutting development dollars and sharply reducing time-to-market. Depending on customer needs, from customizing a feature set, integrating with hardware or mail servers, or porting Spyglass Device Mail to a new platform, Spyglass Professional Services Division is available to help customers get projects done fast and effectively. Pricing Run times, customer support and customization work through Spyglass Professional Services Group are priced according to license volume and scope of work. |
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