Pascack Valley Regional High School District Selects ScanSoft PDF Create! as Standard PDF Solution for Educators

Business Wire, Oct 12, 2004

PEABODY, Mass. -- Evaluated Against Alternatives, ScanSoft PDF Create! Gets Top Grade Based Upon Simple Network Installation and a Superior Balance of Price, Features and Ease-of-Use

ScanSoft, Inc. (Nasdaq: SSFT), the global leader of speech and imaging solutions, today announced that Pascack Valley Regional High School District has selected ScanSoft(R) PDF Create! as the standard PDF creation solution for the district's innovative technology initiative. PDF Create! is a fast and affordable solution that allows users to create PDF from all of their PC applications, and is quickly gaining recognition as a better PDF solution for business and office environments.

This year the Pascack Valley Regional High School District launched its e-learning initiative to leverage hardware and software technology to improve both course instruction and learning; a key element of the initiative was the distribution of laptops to all teachers and students within the district, each configured with standard software applications for enhancing document creation and distribution. Like many academic organizations, PDF has become the standard format used by the Pascack Regional School District for sharing documents via the network, email and the Web.

To enable PDF viewing the district selected the ubiquitous free Adobe Reader, but found historical PDF creation applications expensive and overly complex. Pascack evaluated a number of alternative PDF solutions, finally selecting ScanSoft's PDF Create! as the standard PDF creation application for its teachers and students. PDF Create! gained the top grade in part based upon its simple network installation capabilities, as well as its unique balance of price, features and ease-of-use.

"The goal of our e-learning project is to change in new and different ways the teaching and learning process and to enhance student achievement," said Erich Tusch, district supervisor of technology, Pascack Valley Regional High School District. "Critical to this project are the communication benefits of technology such as ScanSoft's PDF Create!. We needed an easy and efficient way for teachers to create documents that could be shared with students, and PDF Create! fits that bill at a cost effective price. It is easy to use and deploy and doesn't require training - PDF Create! provides exactly what we need in an easy, streamlined fashion and at a great price."

ScanSoft PDF Product Family

--PDF Converter Professional 2.0 - ScanSoft has delivered the first and only product that combines PDF creation with PDF conversion. A bundle of PDF Create! and PDF Converter 2.0, PDF Converter Professional significantly improves productivity by providing business professionals with the ability to more seamlessly move between the two dominant electronic document formats -- Microsoft Word and PDF. With PDF Converter Professional organizations now have access to an industry-leading PDF solution that has the price, performance and features that can put the power of PDF on every business desktop.

--PDF Create! 2.0 - ScanSoft's new PDF Create! enables PDF creation from any Microsoft Windows application through the "print" option, and provides toolbar and mouse shortcuts within Microsoft Office and Windows Explorer. Also included is PDF Create! Assistant, an easy-to-use desktop application that enables the batch conversion of multiple files into the PDF format, as well as merging multiple file formats into a single PDF document. This is especially valuable for sharing specialized documents, such as drawing (Microsoft Visio), photo editing (JASC PaintShop Pro), layout (Microsoft Publisher), CAD (Autodesk AutoCAD), accounting (Intuit QuickBooks), and contact management (ACT!) applications.

--PDF Converter 2.0 - With PDF Converter 2.0, ScanSoft has added or improved upon the features that matter most to make converting PDF to Word easier and more effective than ever before. PDF Converter Assistant enables the batch conversion of multiple files from PDF to Word-without needing to open Microsoft Word. In addition, ScanSoft has added logical form recognition (LFR) to PDF Converter, enabling users to turn PDF forms into Microsoft Word forms that can be edited or filled. Improved format retention ensures that even complex PDF documents with a blend of text, graphics and bullets are formatted accurately, while added support for image-only PDF documents and security encryption ensures that all types of PDF documents are quickly and easily converted.

"We are pleased to have PDF Create! selected by the Pascack Valley Regional School District as its PDF standard," said Robert Weideman, senior vice president, ScanSoft Productivity Applications. "It is clear that PDF continues to grow beyond its traditional publishing roots, and that a wide range of organizations are looking for new products that deliver PDF capabilities specifically suited for their needs. We obviously see PDF Create! and PDF Converter as the better PDF solution for these organizations."