News Release from: Zi Corp
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial Team on 23 September 2004
Sierra Wireless integrates predictive text
Available in key European and North American markets, the Voq Professional Phone, made by Sierra Wireless integrates Zi predictive text technology.
Note: Readers of the Editor’s free email newsletter will have read this news when it was announced. . It’s free!
Available in key European and North American markets, the Voq Professional Phone, made by Sierra Wireless integrates Zi predictive text technology. The phone is available through Dutch carrier KPN, US retail channels, and through key European distributors including A and C Systems, Cedros, Daimler, Dangaard, Hugh Symons, Speeka, Xacom and Yes Telecom for sale in Austria, Belgium, Germany, Holland, Italy, Luxemburg, the Nordics, Switzerland, Spain and the UK. Zi's eZiTap is integrated with Microsoft Windows Mobile software for Smartphones by the Zi Input Method Editor (IME).
The Voq Professional Phone is the first phone on the international market to embed eZiTap, which searches a built-in dictionary and predicts whole words as letters are multi-tapped on the 12 button keypad, allowing users to operate the phone with one hand.
The more eZiTap is used, the "smarter" it becomes and the faster it predicts frequently used words.
The Voq Professional Phone, which was created for business professionals, offers the best features of a mobile phone, messaging device, and a PDA, with the addition of a unique, flip-open qwerty thumbpad for entering text.
"The pre-integration work Zi did with Microsoft, one of our key industry partners, allowed us to bring a differentiated product to market offering user-friendly features like Zi's eZiTap predictive text technology as a standard input mode for use across applications and services on the Voq phone", said Derek Evans, Sierra Wireless Vice President and Managing Director for EMEA.
"Working with Microsoft and Zi have been critical in order to launch a robust product and fill a unique niche in the marketplace".
Glen Morgan, Zi Corp Senior Vice President of Global Sales and Marketing, called the launch of the Voq Professional Phone an important milestone for Zi because of the first use of eZiTap embedded in a phone and the working relationship between Zi, Sierra Wireless and Microsoft on the project.
"The recent launch of the Voq Professional Phone is the culmination of a significant project for Zi and the work we have been doing with Sierra Wireless and Microsoft", Morgan said.
"The Voq Professional Phone will help demonstrate to the global market that our predictive text products are the easiest to use and the most advanced technologies on the global wireless market".
"Innovative technology partners such as Zi, with its eZText and eZiTap text input technologies, will help users of the Voq phone more easily communicate on the go using their Windows Mobile-based devices", said Julie Wymetalek, manager of the Mobility Partner Advisory Council at Microsoft Corp.
Zi engineers worked closely with Microsoft's development team to create an IME that resolves the entire text input interface and display of Zi's text input technologies on the Smartphone platform.
The IME has been extensively tested to ensure users experience a familiar Windows Mobile interface across all the phone's applications and services.
For handset manufacturers, this means they can implement Zi's text input technologies and the IME without any additional man-machine interface (MMI) work and testing.
The Zi IME package for Windows Mobile-based Smartphones includes a fully developed, localised interface, intuitive display, and user cues.
They combine to deliver a non-intrusive IME which runs inside any Windows Mobile-based application requiring text input.
• Zi Corp: contact details and other news
• Other news in Embedded Software and Operating Systems
• Email this news to a colleague
•
• RSS news feed for Zi Corp
• RSS news feed for Embedded Software and Operating Systems
• Electronicstalk Home Page
Copyright © 2000-2006 Pro-Talk Ltd, UK. Based on news supplied by Zi Corp - Subject: eZiTap
Click on the advertisement to visit the advertiser's web site now