Press Release - 043001d

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Press Release

InterWrite Software Brings the Power of Complete Control to Meetings and Presentations

April 30, 2001 – GTCO CalComp Inc. announced today the release of InterWrite Software Version 2.0. InterWrite Software gives the user total control over a meeting or presentation. With a host of features to draw attention to meeting content and to save session notes, InterWrite provides a powerful way to conduct meetings. It allows users to annotate, highlight and modify materials on the screen, as well as save the meeting notes and annotated applications for electronic distribution. With Version 2.0, GTCO CalComp improved InterWrite’s USB drivers, printing quality, and calibration, as well as increased pen detection capabilities. More significantly, Version 2.0 allows InterWrite Software to interact seamlessly with the InterWrite MeetingPad, the company’s personal collaboration device.

InterWrite Software is the key component in GTCO CalComp’s InterWrite Meeting Suite. The InterWrite Meeting Suite is an integrated set of tools for meetings that includes the InterWrite MeetingBoard, an electronic whiteboard, InterWrite MeetingPad, a personal meeting contribution device, and InterWrite Meeting Services for web-based meetings.

With the InterWrite Software, meeting efficiency is increased, as the software allows the presenter to completely manage the flow of information and keep the focus of the meeting on key points. Modified notes, handwritten materials or highlighted marks can be saved electronically in a single file and e-mailed so that the need for note taking in meetings is eliminated. The InterWrite Viewer allows the user to review all the saved images. In the viewing area, users can zoom in and out, delete or change the sequence of the saved images, and create self-executable files to e-mail the notes to participants. The files can also be saved as bitmaps if desired.

InterWrite Software is designed to provide an intuitive, natural working environment. The toolbar is simple and easy to understand, even for first time users. To start the software, the user needs to press a single button on the InterWrite MeetingBoard or simply double click from a PC. The InterWrite toolbar appears on the screen, making it easy for users to change colors of the pens, pick a highlighter or eraser, change line thickness or save the changed presentation. Additional features of the toolbar are one-click Internet access, clear page, a number of user-selectable preferences and the InterWrite Viewer.

InterWrite Software works in several ways. When used with the InterWrite MeetingBoard in Interactive mode, users can project any Windows application and electronically annotate directly on it. The notes are then saved exactly as written, including the underlying application image. User can toggle forward and backward through the saved images to recall important info. The software also features a “blank screen” for action items, drawings or brainstorming. In PC Whiteboard mode operation, users write with dry erase markers (housed in the pens) on the MeetingBoard and use InterWrite to save handwritten notes and drawings. InterWrite’s Viewer provides all the same functionality in PC Whiteboard mode as it does in Interactive mode.

InterWrite Software also works from a PC using either a MeetingPad, the Suite’s personal collaboration device, or other GTCO CalComp input devices (or even a regular mouse, to a limited extent). In this way, remote meeting participants, using InterWrite Meeting Services, can also illustrate their comments in a manner that allows all meeting participants to view their notes.

InterWrite Software is one of the main components of the InterWrite Meeting Suite, a complete line of collaboration products from GTCO CalComp.

Founded in 1975, GTCO was awarded a patent for the invention of the world's first absolute-position electromagnetic digitizing technology. Since then, GTCO CalComp has produced and now supports over one million input systems in fifty countries around the world, sold under some of the most recognized brand names in the peripherals industry. With offices in Columbia MD, Scottsdale AZ and Vienna Austria, GTCO CalComp continues to focus on developing input peripherals that dramatically improve individual and group productivity worldwide.