Tegic Communications Delivers Version 7.2 of Industry Leading T9 Text Input Software

Business Wire, Nov 22, 2004

SEATTLE -- --Leading Alphabetic Text Entry Solution for Mobile Phones and PDAs Offers Enhanced Multi-Lingual Support and Expanded Language Capabilities

--Alpha T9 7.2 Available to Manufacturers of Mobile and Electronic Devices

Tegic Communications, a leading provider of predictive text input software and a wholly owned subsidiary of America Online, Inc., today announced the availability of version 7.2 of its popular T9(R) Text Input software. Tegic's T9 7.2 software offers advanced alphabetic input prediction in multiple languages to help mobile phone and PDA users to more quickly write SMS text messages, mobile instant messages and wireless e-mails.

Specifically, Tegic's T9 Text Input version 7.2 offers enhanced multi-lingual support, which makes it easier for users to switch back and forth between languages when texting. It also offers predictive text dictionaries for three new languages, including Bengali, Tamil and Urdu, bringing the total number of languages that Tegic supports up to 45.

These new upgrades join additional valuable features that were added to Tegic's T9 7 series software earlier this year to provide an increasingly robust end-user experience. They include an enhanced word completion functionality and next word prediction, among others.

"As text messaging and mobile instant messaging gain mainstream acceptance worldwide, we are delivering on our mission to make text entry faster, simpler and globally accessible," said Craig Peddie, general manager, Tegic Communications. "T9 7.2 software sets a new standard for text input convenience and ease-of-use by providing multilingual functionality that help people to communicate more easily."

The New Improvements in Tegic's T9 Text Input Version 7.2 Include:

- Easier Switching Between Languages When Texting: It's not uncommon for people to switch back and forth between languages when speaking or writing to friends and family. Yet mobile users currently have to manually select or change the language in which they want to text in order to do so.

The new multi-lingual enhancement in T9 7.2 software changes all that. It quickly recognizes the language a user is typing in and automatically predicts the word in that language the user most likely wants. With T9 7.2 software, users can text concurrently in two languages without having to change their phone settings.

For example, if a user types in "Buenos Dias! How are you today?" T9 software will know that the user is switching from Spanish to English in the same conversation and will instantly predict the most probable words, saving users both time and keystrokes.

- New T9(R) Language Support for Bengali, Tamil and Urdu: To accommodate the burgeoning mobile market in Southeast Asian countries, Tegic has added three new languages - Bengali, Tamil and Urdu - to its total of 45 language databases.

T9 Text Input is also available in Afrikaans, Arabic, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Icelandic, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean (Hangul), Latvian, Lithuanian, Malay, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Tagalog, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian and Vietnamese.

T9 Text Input supports Simplified and Traditional stroke-based Chinese, as well as phonetic Pinyin, BoPoMoFo, and Phrasal Text Input.

Core Updates Offered in the T9 7 Series Software

Tegic's T9 Text Input version 7.2 also includes all of the core updates offered in the company's 7 series, including:

- Smart Word Completion of Most Frequently Used Terms: Word completion was introduced in T9 version 5.1 software to automatically complete words that users add to the T9(R) database, such as abbreviations, chat phrases, e-mail addresses and URLs. In the 7 series of T9 software, Tegic has enhanced the word completion functionality to quickly learn which words users prefer and to prioritize completion of the words and phrases the user types most often.

- Next Word Prediction: Beyond predicting and completing words, the 7 series of T9 predicts entire phrases based on the phrases a user types most often. Phrases, such as "Call me at home" can be entered with just a few keystrokes, helping users to type less while actually sending more messages.

- Cool, New Manufacturers Databases (MDBs): The 7 series of T9 software makes it easier for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to create and enhance special theme phones by adding customized T9 databases with thematic terms, such as:

*** Lord of the Rings (e.g., Legolas, Eowyn, Mirkwood, etc.)

*** Harry Potter (e.g., Azkaban, Hogwarts, Quidditch Pitch, etc.)

*** NASCAR (e.g., camber, spoiler, oversteer, etc.)

*** Manchester United (e.g., Van Nistelroov, Solskjaer, ManU, etc.)

*** Formula One (e.g., Grand Prix, Ferrari, Renault, etc.)

*** Brasilian Futbol (e.g., Botafogo, Flamengo, Fluminense, etc.)

*** Euro Cup (e.g., Andrade, dribbling, Zagorakis, etc.)