|
For more Canesta press information contact: or
Roeder-Johnson Corporation
(650) 802-1850 http://email.roeder-johnson.com For Symbian press information contact: Valerie Breslow Symbian Ltd. +1 519 585 1700 valbreslow@earthlink.net |
For more Canesta customer information contact: CANESTA, INC. 2833 Junction Avenue, Suite 200 San Jose, California 95134 Tel. (408) 435-1400 www.canesta.com |
SAN JOSE, CA – August 14, 2003 – In response to strong interest by the world's largest mobile phone manufacturers in equipping their cell phones with the Canesta projection keyboard, Canesta Inc. has joined the Symbian Platinum Partner Program. Symbian develops Symbian OS, the global industry standard operating system for advanced mobile phones. Symbian OS is licensed by the world's largest handset manufacturers who account for more than 80% of the world's annual handset sales.
"Symbian OS and its partners are driving demand for advanced mobile phone features that will dramatically improve the usability of cell phones," said Martin Coul, Technology Partner Program Director, Symbian. "As a Symbian Platinum Partner, Canesta is making revolutionary projection keyboard technology available to the Symbian ecosystem which represents a major advance for cell phone users, particularly those who use or wish to use their phones for data-intensive applications."
A projection keyboard uses a tiny pattern projector to create the image of a full-sized keyboard on a flat surface in front of a device such as a cell phone or PDA. When integrated with a companion electronic perception chip, both provided by Canesta based upon technology that it has pioneered, the device can read a user's finger movements as he or she types on the projected keyboard in real time. The Canesta projection keyboard — created literally out of "thin air" — overcomes the limitations of small mobile devices, particularly cell phones with 12 or so keys, to act as an input medium for data-intensive applications such as email, Internet access, or even business tools such as word processing or analytics. By combining the proven utility of a full-sized keyboard with the convenience of cell phones, wireless service providers can envision substantially increased demand for data services over their networks, a fact not lost on the cell phone manufacturers. And of these, the overwhelming majority use Symbian OS as the operating system in their advanced phones.
Canesta demonstrated a projection keyboard running on a Symbian OS-based cell phone at the Symbian Exposium in London in April of this year. Canesta expects that their product will be available on Symbian OS-based phones by early 2004. The Symbian Platinum Partner Program is designed to ensure the close integration of technology such as Canesta's, with Symbian OS.
Canesta is the inventor of a revolutionary, low-cost electronic perception technology that enables ordinary electronic devices to perceive and react to nearby objects or individuals in real time.
When sight-enabled with Canesta's unique electronic perception chips and software, consumer, automotive, industrial, military, and medical products will gain functionality and ease of use not possible in an era when electronics were blind.
Canesta was founded in April 1999, and is located in San Jose, CA. The company has filed or has been granted in excess of forty patents. Investment to date exceeds $20 million, from Carlyle Venture Partners, Apax Partners (formerly Patricof & Co Ventures, Inc.), JP Morgan Partners (formerly Chase Capital Partners), TechFund Capital, and Thales Corporate Ventures (formerly Thomson-CSF Ventures). Canesta has over 40 employees.
Symbian is a software licensing company which develops and licenses Symbian OS, the global open industry standard operating system for advanced, data-enabled mobile phones.
Symbian has licensed Symbian OS to the world's leading mobile phone manufacturers including Motorola, Nokia, Samsung, Siemens and Sony Ericsson. Publicly announced products based on Symbian OS include the BenQ P30, Samsung SGH-D700, Siemens SX-1, NTT DoCoMo FOMA F2102V and F2051 built by Fujitsu, Sony Ericsson P800 Smartphone, Nokia 9200 Communicator range as well as the 7650, 6600, 3650 and N-Gage.
Symbian has its global headquarters in London, United Kingdom with development sites in Europe and Asia.For further information about Symbian, please see www.symbian.com or email press@symbian.com.
