Stamford,
Conn., November 9, 1998 -- Pitney Bowes Inc.
(NYSE: PBI) the world leader in messaging technology,
and @Work Technologies Inc. (New York, NY), a leading
vendor of Internet bill and statement distribution software,
announced today that they have implemented an Internet
billing solution that is tightly integrated with existing
production mail operations.
Pitney
Bowes has incorporated @Work's WorkOutTM server
into the Pitney Bowes Digital Document Delivery (D3) platform.
The D3 solution provides billers with a comprehensive
platform for rendering, distributing, tracking and processing
bills previously distributed on paper through electronic
channels, such as the Internet. It also provides billers
with the capability to enroll participants on-line for
alternative document delivery options.
Pitney
Bowes will utilize its 75 years of experience with more
than 2 million customers worldwide in the production management
of billing statements and other documents for the implementation
of its new D3 service. By using the WorkOut server as a
parsing and presentment engine, the D3 solution enables
billers to utilize existing legacy generated print streams
that contain billing statements in order to repackage them
for publishing in media other than print and mail, such
as the Internet.
"The
D3 solution will enable large volume mailers to distribute
their statements through a wider array of electronic mediums
while at the same time providing overall management of
the outbound messaging process," said Karl Schumacher,
Vice President and General Manager, Pitney Bowes Document
Factory Solutions. "By partnering with @Work Technologies,
we feel that we have truly created a vendor independent
and channel neutral bill delivery platform for our customers."
One
of the unique benefits of the D3 solution is its sophisticated
work-flow tracking capabilities. This allows a biller
or a billing service provider to closely monitor and optimize
every step in the statement rendering process, whether
the bill is delivered on paper or through electronic delivery
channels. The D3 solution also creates tailored, "one-to-one"
personalized documents to maximize their impact for cross
and up-selling potential.
WorkOut
is an innovative software product that securely distributes
high volumes of computer-generated bills over the Internet.
WorkOut can deliver documents as HTML Web pages and richly
formatted HTML or plain text electronic mail messages.
Moreover, since WorkOut supports the Open Financial Exchange
Bill Presentment (OFX-PRES) standard defined by Microsoft,
Intuit and CheckFree, WorkOut and D3 users can be confident
that their billing systems will be compatible with exciting
new on-line banking and electronic commerce applications.
WorkOut is 100% Java application. Consequently, it can
run on virtually any major computing platform. The current
release supports Microsoft Windows NT, Sun Solaris and
most major UNIX platforms.
"The
WorkOut server is capable of parsing billing data out
of virtually any input format, including the complex mainframe
print streams that organizations already use to create
their paper bills." Said Jim Flynn, General Manager of
@Work Technologies. Flynn added: "By integrating WorkOut's
data extraction and presentation capability into the Pitney
Bowes D3 architecture, we are dramatically cutting the
time and cost associated with implementing Internet billing
services by enabling organizations to leverage their existing
bill creation and production mail infrastructure."
About
@Work Technologies
@Work Technologies was founded in 1995 for the purpose
of providing advanced document distribution and electronic
commerce applications by using Java and other Internet-based
technologies. The company is headquartered in New York
City. @Work's staff members have developed some of the
World's leading document management and electronic money
transfer software packages.
Trademarks
WorkOut is a registered trademark of @Work Technologies,
Inc. Java is a registered trademark of Sun Microsystems.
Windows NT is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation.
All other products or company names mentioned are used
for identification purposes only, and may be trademarks
of their respective owners.
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