FAST Customers Concerned Over Accounting Questions, Security Issues and Corporate Concerns Offered Safe Passage by Autonomy10 January 2006
CAMBRIDGE, England, January 9 -- Autonomy Corporation plc (LSE: AU. or AU.L), a global leader in infrastructure software for the enterprise, today announced that it was offering a secure transition route for FAST Search & Transfer ("FAST") customers and partners who may be concerned about FAST's publicly-known accounting questions, software security issues and corporate concerns.
To support FAST customers with such concerns, Autonomy has compiled a "lifeline replacement technology" offering of Autonomy's award-winning Ultraseek product line, including conceptual and keyword modules, available out of the box that will meet all known enterprise information security requirements.
Customers' concerns have arisen due to several high profile press reports regarding FAST.
Most recently Professor Atle Johnsen of the Norwegian School of Economics questioned FAST's accounting practices in an article entitled "Professor Says That FAST is Breaking the Law" carried on 29 December, 2005 in Norway's financial newspaper Dagens Naeringsliv. Recent weeks have also seen a battle for shareholder control of FAST, the existence of foreign offers and disclosure of tax avoidance issues involving 75% of the Board of Directors of FAST together with FAST's potential liability for the multi-million dollar tax obligations.
In addition a recent report in the Wall Street Journal on 19 December, 2005 entitled "Making Searches Work at Work" highlighted concerns about FAST implementations which were unable to observe enterprise security standards. FAST customers facing potential legal and fiscal implications of failing to achieve the prerequisite standards required to secure their enterprise information have become increasingly vocal, and the Wall Street Journal article featured one FAST customer who was forced to switch off FAST products accessing anything but publicly available information.
A number of FAST customers have also expressed concern having selected Autonomy software after licensing FAST software but abandoning failed implementations. As a result Autonomy is now offering safe passage to all FAST customers for rapid migration to Autonomy's equivalent Ultraseek product line.
The world's largest and most secure intelligence organizations have deployed Autonomy to safeguard their most sensitive information assets because Autonomy's Intellectual Asset Protection System (IAS) is a comprehensive and modular security architecture that provides all aspects of security management including document and intradocument access control against user, group and role level entitlement. Encrypted inter-machine and intra-process communication protocols are woven into the fabric of Autonomy's modular design at a fundamental level, providing secure transmission of information throughout the architecture.
Stouffer Egan, Autonomy's group Chief Strategy Officer, said "Autonomy has seen a number of FAST customers who have chosen Autonomy after experiencing FAST's technology and expressing concerns over recent events. Autonomy products are increasingly being used to replace technologies that cannot faithfully observe often complex and sophisticated enterprise security models, as evidenced by Autonomy's 90% win rate in head-to-head comparisons with FAST, regardless of FAST's deep discounting practices. At the same time Autonomy's acknowledged industry leading position offers FAST customers a stable vendor dedicated to the future of their needs, unencumbered by extraneous issues."
While the future of FAST may be unclear, Autonomy is the acknowledged, unmatched industry leader. Autonomy's recent acquisition of Verity, Inc. has created the largest, strongest organization, with customers benefiting from a powerful combination of technology leadership and customer-facing strengths in sales, support and professional services. The Autonomy safe passage program offers FAST customers the ability to upgrade their FAST search solution to the stable, market leader.
For more information, please contact sales@autonomy.com.
About Autonomy
Autonomy Corporation plc (LSE: AU. or AU.L) is a global leader in infrastructure software for the enterprise. Autonomy's technology powers solutions dependent upon unstructured information including enterprise search ,call center, customer relationship management, business process management, knowledge management, portals, online publishing and security and intelligence systems.
Autonomy's best of breed technology has benefited more than 16,000 global companies in both the public and private sectors. Global customers include Ford, Associated Press, Deutsche Bank, BAE Systems, Sun Microsystems and public sector agencies including the U.S. Department of Defense, NASA and the U.K. Houses of Parliament. Autonomy plays a key role for government organizations across the globe and has been adopted as the organization standard at the US Department of Homeland Security. Strategic reseller and OEM partners include leading SOFTWARE companies such as BEA, Business Objects, Citrix, EDS, IBM Global Services, FileNet, Novell, Veritas, Vignette, Supportsoft and Sybase. The company has offices worldwide.
The Autonomy Group includes: Aungate, a leader in technology for Real-Time Enterprise Governance; Virage, a leading provider of rich media communication and content management software; etalk, a leading provider of enterprise-class contact center products; Cardiff, a leading provider of business process management software; and other product brands and divisions including Ultraseek.
Contacts:
Stouffer Egan
Autonomy Corporation plc
+1-415-243-9955
sales@autonomy.com
Source: prnewswire
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