724 Solutions' XSAM Sentinel Enhances Subscriber Access to Content and Communications with Key Industry Partnerships
724 Solutions' XSAM Sentinel provides and end-to-end solution for access control, policy management and policy enforcement of premium content
Santa Barbara, CA (May 25, 2006) - 724 Solutions (TSX: SVN; Pink Sheets: SVNX), a leading provider of next-generation IP-based network and data services, today announced it had strengthened its Sentinel offering with two key reseller agreements with SurfControl for its content categorization URL database and with Aristotle for its trusted "Integrity" age and identity verification solution. 724's Sentinel offering now provides an end-to-end solution that enables personalized management of access and consumption of wireless services and content, and control over peer-to-peer communications of SMS and MMS.
724's XSAM Sentinel allows mobile operators to create trusted environments beyond the boundaries of their network giving subscribers a choice on how to personalize and manage access to value added content or communications; protecting minors from inappropriate content and enabling verified subscribers to access their subscribed content. XSAM Sentinel provides a comprehensive suite of network and application security functions that include real-time age verification, dynamic and personalized policy management, spending limits, real-time content optimization and filtering, and URL categorization.
SurfControl Web Filter provides a URL categorization database queried in real-time to identify the nature of the content enabling 724's Sentinel to determine the suitability of the content for delivery based on policies personalized by the end-user, account owner or mobile operator. "Providing real-time classification of content gives mobile operators the confidence that policies and subscriber preferences are enforced in the delivery of multimedia content," said Rocco Donnino, Vice President of Worldwide OEM and Business Development at SurfControl.
Aristotle's Integrity service is the leading international fraud prevention, age and identity verification service that integrates with government issued ID databases covering 153 nations. "Identity and age verification are critical when offering a variety of premium multimedia content and services," said John Phillips, Chief Executive Officer of Aristotle. "Service providers are looking to create a trusted services environment to securely and responsibly grow their premium content revenues."
"As unwired services expand deeper into our mobile lifestyle it is becoming critical to provide tools that allow the subscribers to personalize and manage access to new content, communication services and relationships with others in their communities," said Michael Luna, Chief Technology Officer of 724 Solutions. "Pulling together and integrating the best of breed elements of a policy enforcement system, accelerates the time to market of new services for our customers without risking the security or safety of their subscribers."
724's XSAM Sentinel uniquely separates enforcement management and policy management, which allows the solution to be deployed in many flexible configurations that suit the service providers environment. The solution can either be deployed as a centralized platform providing both enforcement and the policy decision functions or partially distributed, defining rules centrally and enforcing in multiple parts of the network, leveraging existing assets performing similar functions (e.g. other enforcement platforms, WAP gateway, SMSC and MMSC). The solution's powerful business logic is based on a set of flexible activities, re-usable across workflows, which define the policies used to enforce access to various premium services and the communication channels being offered to subscribers.
About 724 Solutions
724 Solutions delivers intelligent any-to-any service message and traffic handling solutions built upon a common carrier-grade architecture that allows mobile network operators and virtual network operators to rapidly deploy flexible and open next generation IP-based network and data services. The company's solutions enable the Unwired Lifestyle™, 724's vision of seamless communication without barriers; a vision of how subscribers will use mobile data services to enhance and enrich their professional and private lives with services relevant to their specific needs, with user communities preserved across generations of technology and with data services as reliable and ubiquitous as voice services. 724 Solutions is a global company headquartered in Santa Barbara, California and with development centers in Canada, Switzerland and India. 724 Solutions is privately owned by Austin Ventures. For more information, visit www.724.com.
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward Looking Statements
This press release contains statements of a forward-looking nature. These statements are made under the "safe harbor" provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and of Canadian provincial securities laws. These statements include the statements herein regarding: the services and products that will be offered by 724 Solutions, the benefits that businesses and individuals will obtain from these services and products, future demand for these services and products, our plans and prospects, and the future trading of our common shares. The accuracy of these statements may be impacted by a number of business risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results and events to differ materially from those projected or anticipated, including the risk and possibility that 724 Solutions will be unable to deploy its solutions and products, the risk that the demand for these solutions and products, or for 2.5G and 3G networks, will not increase as presently anticipated, the risk that general economic conditions will not improve or deteriorate, the risk of uncertainty in terms of future actions or statements on the part of applicable securities regulators and stock exchanges, the risk that one or more securities firms will not make a market in 724 Solutions' common shares or will not file the appropriate forms to enable trading in the U.S., and the risk that any failure by 724 Solutions to complete its proposed going-private transaction will further reduce the liquidity of its common shares. Additional information about these and other risks can be found in 724 Solutions' filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and with the Canadian Securities Administrators, including in the sections "Risk Factors" and "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations" of its annual report on Form 10-K and its quarterly reports on Form 10-Q. These risks are also described in 724 Solutions' filings with the Canadian Securities Administrators. 724 Solutions does not undertake any obligation to update this forward-looking information, except as required under applicable law.
Other Disclosure Documents
724 Solutions has filed a Management Information Circular and Proxy Statement and other documents in preliminary form with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC") and with the Canadian Securities Administrators regarding its arrangement agreement with Austin Ventures VIII, L.P. and an affiliated entity, 724 Holdings, Inc., by which 724 Holdings, Inc. would acquire all the outstanding common shares of 724 Solutions not owned by Austin Ventures or its related persons. These documents contain, and when amended and filed in definitive form will contain, important information about the transaction, and 724 Solutions urges you to read these documents. You may obtain copies of all documents filed with the SEC regarding this transaction, free of charge, at the SEC's website (www.sec.gov) and you may obtain copies of all documents filed with the Canadian Securities Administrators regarding this transaction, free of charge, at www.sedar.com.
724 Solutions and certain of its affiliates may be deemed to be participants in the solicitation of proxies in connection with the proposed arrangement. A description of the interests of certain of 724 Solutions' directors and executive officers in the Company is set forth in the Company's annual report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2005. Additional information regarding the persons who may, under the rules of the SEC, be deemed participants in the solicitation of proxies in connection with the proposed arrangement, and a description of their direct and indirect interests in the proposed arrangement, as well as the interests of the Company's executive officers and directors, are set forth in the Management Information Circular and Proxy Statement.
For more information, contact:
Avichai Levy, VP Marketing Mobixell Networks
Tel: +972 544 666 785
Avichai.levy@mobixell.com
Kirsten Scott and Kim Smith, éclat Marketing
Tel: +44 (0)1276 486000
mobixell@eclat.co.uk
