eCollege’s Compatibility with Impatica Builds on Open Platform Initiative
Integration Improves Playback Quality and Efficiency of PowerPoint Presentations for Students with Limited Connection Speeds
DENVER – October 31, 2002 – eCollege(SM) [Nasdaq: ECLG], a leading provider of technology and services for online higher education programs, today announced eCollege AU+(SM) compatibility with Impatica as part of a continued commitment to provide an open platform that works with other applications. Using Impatica for PowerPoint, a desktop tool that converts PowerPoint files for streaming over the Internet even at modem speeds, allows faculty to incorporate dynamic presentations into their eCollege AU+ courses, and have peace of mind that students with slower connection speeds can still enjoy a high quality eLearning experience.
“We continue to advance the compatibility of our system in an effort to make it easier for users to take advantage of various applications outside of our platform,” said Oakleigh Thorne, chairman and CEO of eCollege. “This particular initiative is reflective of our focus on the fully online distance learning student who may only have access to a limited connection from home. Impatica makes it possible for these students to experience fully narrated and animated presentations, even from a 28.8 connection.”
Impatica converts the Microsoft PowerPoint file, including text, graphics, transitions, animations effects and narration, into a compressed format that is optimized for streaming over the Internet. The Impatica file is typically 95 percent smaller than the PowerPoint HTML files. These presentations can also be synchronized to video and scrolling text, complete with indexing, navigation and search capabilities.
The Impatica integration builds on eCollege’s HTTP compression functionality, which provides faster content delivery speeds and helps users eliminate bandwidth issues. Faculty simply upload the Impatica presentation file into their eCollege AU+ course, and then students can access the presentation from a wide range of Internet devices, including Java enabled personal digital assistants (PDAs), without plug-ins.
“eCollege is truly one of the leaders in the online distance learning market, and it is great to see the company further addressing the needs of those students who have a variety of modem speeds,” said Michael G. Doyle, chairman and CEO of Impatica Inc. “It is estimated that some 30 million presentations are generated using PowerPoint every day. It is widely used in academia, and we are pleased to work with eCollege to increase its efficiency among a growing, online student population.”
About Impatica Inc.
Impatica products enable users of Microsoft PowerPoint and Macromedia Director™ to deliver their content plug-in free, to Java-enabled computers and other devices, even at dial-up speeds. These presentations can be synchronized to video and scrolling text, complete with indexing, navigation, and search capabilities using Impatica OnCue. More than 750 organizations including over 300 colleges and universities and hundreds of corporations use Impatica products to communicate more effectively with hundreds of thousands of people every day. For more information, visit www.impatica.com.
About eCollege
eCollege [Nasdaq: ECLG] is a leading eLearning technology and services provider to educational markets. eCollege designs, builds and supports high quality online degree, certificate/diploma and professional development programs for colleges, universities, school districts and state departments of education. The company was founded in 1996 and is headquartered in Denver. For more information, visit www.eCollege.com.
This news release contains “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the securities laws. These statements are based on management’s current expectations and are subject to a number of uncertainties and risks. Actual results may differ materially. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from estimates or projections contained in the forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, the possibility of our network infrastructure and computer systems failing; the performance and limitations of vendor software; our ability to successfully integrate third party software; future technological advances by our competitors; and such other factors as are discussed in our most recent Form 10-K Annual Report filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”), which you are encouraged to review in connection with this release. We believe that these forward-looking statements are reasonable, however, you should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, which are based on current expectations and speak only as of the date of this release. We are not obligated to publicly release any revisions to forward-looking statements to reflect events after the date of this release.
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