NEW YORK-The recent “Internet & E-Business Conference & Expo” brought together a host of players occupying various niches in cyberspace, and some may become shining stars in the wireless galaxy.
Boston-based WebMap Technologies Inc. has developed a proprietary content mapping software that turns pixels into links, which users can click on to find detailed information. The three-tiered system architecture melds together topography, content and context, said Tobias Kleitman, sales director.
“Users are frustrated, especially in wireless. This is an instant experience,” said Michael Iron, chief executive officer and co-founder.
“It is reasonable to expect our system architecture to be ready for wireless by year-end, and we are looking to roll it out with a major partner.”
LogicTree, College Park, Md., wants to let your voice instead of your fingers do the walking through e-mail. Its VoxLink platform allows users to give voice commands to access data from any wireless or wireline phone anywhere in the world, said Amir Khosrowdad, director of product management. They can have e-mail read to them, respond verbally to e-mail or speak to create and send new messages.
“WML is native to our platform, so all that money carriers spent on WAP has not gone to waste,” he said.
San Francisco-based Brience Inc. said it recently became a licensee offering the Openwave Mobile Access Gateway, formerly known as the Openwave UP-Link Server, to wireless carriers in North and South America
“Brience Carrier Services is providing wireless service providers a pay-as-you-go option to use the Mobile Access Gateway platform to provide mobile Internet services to wireless subscribers,” the company said.
Moinsoft Company Ltd., Seoul, South Korea, seeks to export its wireless Internet solutions to carriers and equipment vendors outside Asia. SK Telecom is using Moinsoft’s i-Wapffice, which works on Oracle databases, to provide customer service functions accessible from mobile phones, said Myeongho Roh, president and chief executive officer.
Samsung has deployed Moinsoft’s JarCube, based on Enterprise Java Bear, for online procurement. LG Telecom plans to use Moinsoft’s i-Wapper interactive communications and information exchange system for cellular and personal communications services customers, Roh said.
BoldFish, Santa Clara, Calif., has just released a new version if its Express Server, which the company said, “allows organizations to send their high-volume e-mail faster and more reliably than before without the need for extensive internal IT support or additional IT infrastructure.” The BoldFish ES also supports wireless content.
As its corporate name implies, CyberShift Inc., Parsippany, N.J., is in business to help large corporations manage their mobile workers more efficiently. Its new CyberShift Mobile will allow employees to clock on and off their shifts and to input time spent on tasks, projects and accounts, all via WAP-enabled phones or personal digital assistants with Web clipping functionality. They can also manage certain human resources functions, like requesting vacation days.
“We go through ROI (return on investment) investigations with potential customers. In the wireless market, we already have some target customers,” said Jon-Marc Patton, product manager.
Limited available bandwidth is the biggest impediment he sees to more widespread deployment of productivity enhancing tools like CyberShift Mobile. A company like Metricom, which is facing shutdown, “should appeal to corporate users because it could offer them increased bandwidth at strategic locations, like construction sites, using booster antennas,” Patton said.
